


Into the Woods

by Nightfoot



Category: Tales of Vesperia
Genre: Cults, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friendship, Gen, Horror, Panic Attacks, Suicidal Thoughts, character with anxiety
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-28
Updated: 2020-05-23
Packaged: 2021-02-28 07:21:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 74,405
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22940095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nightfoot/pseuds/Nightfoot
Summary: With the blastia gone, Estelle is desperate to find an alternative for protecting cities.  When she receives a letter describing a town deep in the forest that has gotten along without blastia for generations, she and Yuri see no other choice than to travel there to learn more.  The strange little village they hoped would be salvation turns out to be a nightmare.
Comments: 6
Kudos: 41
Collections: Tales Big Bang 2020





	1. Nightmares

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the 2019-2020 Tales Big Bang! It will updated every other day, since it's already finished and just needs editing.

Yuri gripped the washbasin on the dresser with white-knuckled hands. It rattled as his shaking transfered into it. _You are not going to die_ , he stubbornly told himself, even though the pain his chest opined otherwise and the terror of impending death overwhelmed him. He stared into the mirror, his white face distorted by his swirling vision. If he could just focus, maybe he could control his breathing, but as it was, his heart was trying to escape his chest with every frantic beat and his rapid gasps barely brought him any air. Was this a heart attack? Whatever it was, he knew with dreadful certainty that here, now, was how he was going to die.

Then, as suddenly as this feeling had come over him, it began to pass. Yuri loosened his grip on the basin and took deep, rib-cracking breaths to savour his new ability to breathe. The fear that had consumed him faded into the background and he was at last able to get a hold of himself. Yuri stared at his reflection. In the dark room, light under the door was the only illumination that shone on his pale, clammy face. Scowling, he cupped water from the bowl and splashed it over his face. The shock of cold startled his senses, forcing them to notice that he was safe and sound in the castle and not about to be eaten by a monster.

This had been the fourth time this had happened in the two months since destroying the Adephagos. The first time, he’d been lying in bed and letting his mind wander over the past. It had stopped to smell the roses in the memory of Tarquaron, and the next thing he knew, crippling panic had overwhelmed him. The second time, he didn’t even have a concrete explanation. The panic had come over him on a stroll through Zaphias without prompting, and he felt lucky to have been close enough to the Comet to make it home before it reached its peak. The third time had been much like the first, and this time he had the most glamorous of excuses: a damn nightmare.

Yuri wasn’t sure exactly when he’d woken up. The terror of the dream had faded seamlessly into waking panic. Even now, he pressed his hands on the dresser to ground himself in the real world. He was in the castle. Karol and Judith were in guest rooms down the hall. Rita was studying in Halure. Everyone was alive. The Adephagos was gone. _Calm down_.

“What is wrong with me?” Yuri muttered at the mirror and then turned away with a scowl. A shadow in the corner made his heart skip a beat, but it was just Repede shifting in his sleep. Annoyed at how jumpy he was, he went to the window.

Yuri pushed the curtains open and let the dawn sun illuminate the room. Flowery bushes spread out a few storeys below him and he folded his arms on the windowsill. In the distance and far below, smoke rose from the ramshackle rooftops of the lower quarter. He still felt like a class traitor every time he looked at his old neighbourhood from the castle. It was sensible, though. They’d set up a guild office in Dahngrest and Yuri had moved all his belongings over there with the expectation of making Dahngrest his permanent home from now on. Preventing the innkeeper from renting out his old room at The Comet just in case he was in town was unfair to her. As much as he would love to rent a room down in the parts of Zaphias he was more comfortable in, Flynn and Estelle said it ridiculous to pay for lodging when there were plenty of empty guest rooms at the castle.

Maybe sleeping in a familiar place would keep his brain from getting so jumpy, though. So far, none of his friends knew about the panic attacks and he intended to keep it that way. Just imagining the looks Karol or Estelle would give him made him feel pathetic.

Yuri yawned and stretched his back. The sun was barely over the horizon, but he was up and still too keyed up to go back to sleep. Yuri grabbed a shirt hanging over the back of a chair and threw it over his head. It clung to the sweat on his back and he wished it was socially acceptable to go shirtless when it was hot. Spring was rapidly coming to a close and the coming summer seemed to be preparing so much heat that some of it slipped in early.

Barefoot and tousle-haired, Yuri set off in pursuit of coffee. If any other castle residents had a problem with him strolling the corridors in such a grungy state, they could take it up with Estelle… eventually, because Estelle was out of town at the moment. Though the sun had risen, the castle was still quiet. This close to midsummer’s day, dawn came much earlier than lazy nobles preferred to get up. Other than a few servants in the halls, the first sign of life Yuri found was in the kitchen. The staff was hard at work getting ready for the breakfast rush in another hour or so, and Yuri slipped in unnoticed.

He poured himself a mug and felt better just breathing in the fumes. He would have a nice drink, get dressed, and then finally take care of that thing he’d been worrying about so he could relax.

Yuri dumped a spoonful of sugar into his mug as he tried to remember what that thing even was. He wracked his brain, struggling to remember what important task he was stressed about, and came up empty. Yuri set down the spoon, took a bug gulp, and let his muscles un-tense with the realization that there wasn’t anything to do after all. Brave Vesperia had come to Zaphias to respond to a job request, but the job was done and paid for and they’d be heading back to Dahngrest this evening. At the moment, he had zero responsibilities. He had no jobs, no one was waiting for him to accomplish something, and nowhere to go.

This realization made him feel oddly unbalanced. He’d carried the weight of the world on his shoulders for so long, and its absence now kept him perpetually feeling like he was forgetting something.

Something whacked his ear. Yuri spun around, coffee sloshing over the rim, heart in his throat. His spare hand flew to the counter to find a weapon before he realized it was just the head cook.

“What do you think you’re doing?” the woman snapped.

Yuri, silently berating himself for being so jumpy, glanced at the coffee he had been drinking and then then looked back to the woman. “Is this a trick question?”

“Put that drink down, you lout, and help prepare the trays.”

Understanding dawned. He shook his head while his heart rate began to return to normal. “Lady, I don’t work here.”

She startled. “Then what are you doing in the castle?”

He took it as a badge of pride that she didn’t think he looked like he belonged in the castle. “I’m a guest of the commandant’s. Or the princess’. Or both, I guess.”

“Oh! Yes, I was told the princess’ friends from the Union were staying here!” She quickly curtsied to him and Yuri’s feelings of class treason spiked. “Forgive me, sir. But, why did you come to the kitchen to get coffee?”

He stared at her for a second. “I didn’t think there was a coffee machine in the library.”

“Well… yes, but… you should have asked a servant to fetch it for you.”

Yuri took another sip of coffee. It was too early for this. “I didn’t want to bother them. Sorry, I’ll get out of your hair now.”

“No, no, sir, please go where you wish! I’ll leave you in peace!” She hurried away before Yuri could insist that he had never been a ‘sir’ in his life and intended to keep it that way.

Yuri was about to leave to nurse his coffee in the quiet of his guest room when a couple of serving girls began whispering not far away.

“You take it.”

“No, you.”

“I need to help with the eggs.”

“You have time to carry coffee!”

The girls were only a little older than Karol, and looked like Karol about to confront a Giganto monster. Yuri said, “You girls need help with something?”

They startled and looked up at him nervously. “Uh - uh, no, it’s just….”

“She’s supposed to take coffee to the commandant,” the other girl said and jabbed a finger at her companion. “But she’s chickening out.”

“I am not!” Her friend batted the accusatory finger down. “One of us is supposed to but she didn’t say it had to be me.”

Yuri rested a hand on his hip. “I wouldn’t have thought coffee delivery was such a difficult task.”

The girls exchanged nervous looks. “Yes, but… he’s the _commandant_.”

“When if I say something dumb and he gets mad?”

“What if the coffee gets cold on the trip up and he’s upset and yells at me?”

Yuri tried to imagine Flynn yelling at a fourteen year old girl for any reason, but the picture failed to materialize. “You know, he really isn’t that kind of guy.”

The girls seemed unconvinced. “What if he’s in a meeting and we have to interrupt him?”

“Or just working alone. What do you even say to interrupt the commandant while he’s working?”

Yuri’s answer was ‘hey, loser,’ but he didn’t think these girls wanted to hear that. “Look, if it’s this terrifying, I’ll take it for you.”

“Would you really?”

“Wow, you’re so brave!”

“Uh… right.” Yuri poured another mug of coffee and, knowing Flynn, ignored the sugar bowl. Flynn had terrible taste. Two mugs in hand, he left the kitchen.

Yuri was not surprised to find Flynn already sitting at his desk and shuffling through papers when Yuri pushed the door open with a song-song call of, “Delivery!”

“Thank you, I-” Flynn raised his head. “Yuri?”

“Coffee, actually.” He set both of their mugs on the desk. “The half-empty one is mine.”

Flynn glanced at them and raised his eyebrows. “I know. Yours is always the one with so much cream and sugar added, it resembles chocolate milk.”

Yuri shrugged. “If someone put caffeine in chocolate milk I could skip the middle man.”

Flynn shook his head as he dragged his mug toward himself. “You’re such a child. Why are you up this early, anyway?”

Yuri shrugged and sat on the edge of Flynn’s desk. Something about sitting across from Flynn, his back to the door, made him feel uneasy. “Birds woke me up. What’s your excuse?”

Flynn tore his annoyed gaze away from Yuri’s position and looked at the papers strewn across his desk. “Alexei left a mess. I’m spending most of my time just sorting through everything, and half of it is classified and can’t even be delegated to aids. As if I don’t have enough on my plate with what’s going on now without trying to sort through years of poorly organized schemes. You know Alexei didn’t even alphabetize his files?”

Yuri let out a dramatic gasp and pressed a hand to the side of his face. “A monster.”

Flynn glared at the documents for a moment and then looked up upon realizing Yuri was making fun of him. He stared at Yuri and then said, “What’s wrong?”

Yuri would have flinched if his muscles weren’t already tense. “What do you mean? Nothing’s wrong.”

“Yuri. I’ve known you for fifteen years. I can tell when something is bothering you.”

He focused his attention on his drink. “Nothing is bothering me.” It was true, too. Once he dealt with that situation pressing on his nerves, he’d - no. No, there was no situation. There was nothing he had to deal with, so he absolutely had nothing bothering him. “You’re seeing things.”

Flynn gave him a hard look and then shrugged. “If you don’t want to talk to me, I hope you talk to someone at least. Lady Estellise will be back sometime before noon.”

She’d left just before Yuri, Karol, and Judith arrived yesterday. Apparently there had been a monster attack in a small town west of Zaphias and she wanted to do what she could to treat the injured. Considering every other healer in the world had just lost access to healing artes and were now scrambling to figure out non-magical medicine, her skills were in high demand.

Yuri didn’t like the implication that Flynn was sending him to Estelle to talk about his issues, though. Estelle had enough on her plate without dealing with his issues, too. She’d had just as much stress during their journey as he had, and she seemed to be handling it on her own just fine.

A knock came to the door and then an aid poked her head in. “Excuse the interruption, sir, but Princess Estellise’s party has returned from Midbell.”

Flynn stood right away. “Excellent, thank you. I’ll meet with Lieutenant Brays as soon as he is able.” To Yuri, he said, “I’m sorry to cut this short, but I need to see how the mission went.”

Yuri hopped off the desk. “It’s fine. I’ll follow you to say hi to Estelle.”

“Oh, good, it will be nice for you two to chat.”

Yuri ignored the implication that he should be chatting with Estelle about what was bothering him. He didn’t need to talk about it.

The pair made their way down the halls. Yuri expected to hear a commotion as they reached the returning band of knights, but the group was eerily silent as they trudged through the corridor. Yuri shared a glance with Flynn; they shared the same foreboding feeling.

Yuri’s worries came to a head when he reached the group, looked up and down the ranks, and said, “Where’s the rest of the party?”

A nearby knight just gave him a tired look.

“Where’s Estelle?” His episode this morning had left Yuri feeling like he was walking on a ledge, and now the fear that Estelle was with all the other knights who hadn’t made it home had him pinwheeling on the edge.

“Over there,” the knight said and jerked a thumb.

Yuri pulled his panicking brain away from the edge. Estelle was fine. When he found her near the head of the crowd, though, he realized she wasn’t fine. She stood near the well, hugging herself and inspecting the floor with a morose expression. Even worse, the front of her white dress was splattered with red stains.

“Lady Estellise!” Flynn hurried toward her, his eyes fixed on the blood.

She looked up, startled from her reverie. “Oh! Flynn, Yuri, hello.”

Estelle usually greeted him with a beam, but her inner light had gone out. The smile she forced on her mouth only highlighted how miserable her eyes were.

“Are you injured?” Flynn asked at once.

“Oh… no.” She glanced down, the smile already vanishing, and pressed her hands against the blood on her stomach. “This… it isn’t mine.”

“Commandant, sir.” Another knight came up to them, and based on his uniform was the lieutenant Flynn had been looking for. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but I’d like to speak with you abut the mission.”

Flynn glanced between Estelle and Brays, obviously torn, and then his expression landed on Yuri with a silent: Take care of Estellise, please.

Yuri nodded in understanding and Flynn hurried off with the lieutenant. Yuri leaned against the wall with Estelle, where they both stood silently for a moment. Estelle inspected her skirt while Yuri surveyed the sombre attitude of the knights still milling about in the hall. He sighed and said, “The mission went that bad, did it?”

Estelle’s silence spoke volumes, as did her final gasp of, “Oh, _Yuri_.”

Yuri opened his mouth, wasn’t sure what to say, closed it again, and then ended up with, “Let’s get out of here.” He wrapped an arm around her shoulders and guided her away from the hall.

They didn’t talk much on their way to Estelle’s room. Yuri wanted to wait until they could sit in a safe and comfortable environment before asking her for any details and Estelle seemed to appreciate his quiet comfort for the time. When they arrived in her room, he led her to her bed and let her sit there as he opened the wardrobe to find a clean dress.

“Here.” He tossed what he hoped wasn’t a nightgown on her bed. “Get out of those dirty clothes and you’ll feel better.”

“Thank you,” she murmured.

Yuri strolled away from the bed and stood near the door with his back to her. A vision of Estelle holding a sword through the crack in the door and locking him out while she got changed flickered through his mind. It was hard to believe that less than a year ago, Estelle cautiously mentioned she’d been warned to be careful around him in case they ever met. After all their time on the road, camping between cities with small tents or under the sky, the idea of being shy around each other was laughable.

Fabric rustled as Estelle began to speak. “You know we went to respond to a monster attack in Midbell, right?”

“So I heard.”

“It’s a pretty small village, but it’s close enough to Zaphias to get there in a few hours of walking. There was a report of a horde of monsters moving close, so Lieutenant Brays decided to lead his unit to Midbell to fortify defences… they’ve only half-finished constructing their wall. I decided to go with them, in case there were any injuries. But… then we got there….” There was a flop as the skirt of the dress she’d just put on dropped to her ankles, and then the bed springs squeaked as she sat down again. “You can turn around.”

Yuri did so and found her sitting hunched over, hands clasped together, arms on her lap. “You were too late?”

“There… wasn’t much of the town left. The horde had easily broken through the town’s little militia. Most of the populace fled or… or they….”

Were eaten, Yuri mentally supplied as he saw the shadows of what Estelle had seen cross her face.

“It was awful, Yuri.” She shuddered. “Brays ordered his troops to retake the village, but by that point, it was only stragglers barricaded in attics or basements to be saved. All night, we tried to find as many still-living wounded as we could. There were people everywhere… _parts_ of people everywhere….” She pressed her face into her hands and Yuri slid onto the bed beside her.

“I did the best I could, but I only have so much magic before I’m too exhausted. But the wounded kept coming, even after I was so worn out I could barely cast the mildest of First Aid. They needed so much more than a basic First Aid, too. I can’t - even when my magic is at its strongest I can’t put limbs back on or - or do anything for the mother shoving her hours-dead toddler at me. We found a family in a cellar. Their - their door had b-broken in and… a pack of ratwiggles… they were eating them. I tried to help!” Estelle leaned against Yuri, shaking. “One of them was s-still alive, but - but too far gone - I couldn’t fix that much blood and tissue loss.”

Yuri felt sick just picturing it and wrapped his arm tight around her shoulders. There was nothing to say. Estelle shuddered as the horrors from the night before finally cracked through her shield and she began to weep.

“Th-there were… monsters eating babies, Yuri.”

Yuri rubbed her shoulders and wished he had some way to make her feel better. He was in no position to comfort her, though, because a horrible, slimy weight had filled his chest and threatened to suffocate him. Estelle was obviously traumatized by what she’d seen last night, but it was so much more than that. Monsters had done the damage to the town, but the reason the monsters had been able to do that was the loss of barrier blastias. And who was to blame for eliminating blastia from the world?

It was the only option, Yuri told himself as his mind teetered on the edge once more. If they had refused to sacrifice the blastia, the Adephagos would have killed those people anyway.

_But what if there had been another way?_

The thought had plagued Yuri for two months. They hadn’t even been entirely confident that Brave Vesperia No. 1 would work. Had they really gambled the fate of the world on something that wasn’t a sure bet? It had seemed like their only option at the time, but what if they’d been hasty and scrambled for the first solution they thought of? Millions of people might have died. Thousands of people still would die from the lack of blastia. He was so close to falling off the edge that he could feel his heart rate start to accelerate, and squeezed Estelle as much to ground himself as to provide comfort.

Estelle gained control of her crying long enough to say something that refocused Yuri’s mind away from his own stress. “It - it was all my fault.”

“It wasn’t,” he said firmly. “We all made the decision to get rid of blastia. Flynn, Ioder, and the others were on board, too.”

“Not that….” She rubbed her eyes on the pale purple sleeve of her dress. “We all chose to g-get rid of blastia. But… we wouldn’t have had to make that decision if Phaeroh had killed me like he wanted to.”

Yuri’s heart plummeted. The only good thing about this was that Yuri was able to push his own problems to the side the moment he had someone else to worry about. “That wasn’t an option.”

“I’m sorry, Yuri, I know you told me that thinking it’s ok if I have to die isn’t ok. I want to believe you’re right, but the thing is, if I had died, then Alexei could never have raised Zaude, and the Adephagos would never have been released, and we never would have given up blastia, and Midbell would still have a barrier, and all those people wouldn’t be dead.”

“That’s….” Yuri struggled to find something to day. The sequence of events was technically true, but it still didn’t mean Estelle should have sacrificed herself.

“We chose to get rid of blastia because it would cause hundreds or thousands to die instead of millions, but there was a third choice. We could have let just one die: me.”

Yuri shook his head. “That wasn't an option.”

“But it _was_!” She turned her head to face him with agonized eyes. “Phaeroh said I was an insipid poison. We didn’t listen. We were too busy prioritizing my life over the lives of everyone else in the world. You said so yourself - if a part is infected, you cut it off to save the whole!”

Yuri frowned. “That’s what I thought, but I was wrong. People aren’t parts to be cut off. Besides, we can’t live our lives if we keep worrying about what could have been. We didn’t know the Adephagos was a risk when we told Phaeroh to shove it. Nothing that happened was your fault.”

“Maybe not my fault… but you can’t deny that if I were dead, none of this would have happened.”

Yuri sighed and stood. He rested a hand on his hip as he stared down at her and tried to find words that would make her feel less wretched. Considered how he also felt, it was like hoping a can of black paint to lighten up a dark grey. “I don’t know, Estelle. We don’t know what would have happened. We did the best we could with the information we had, and that’s all anyone in this world can do.” He rested a hand on her shoulder. “What’s done is done. You still have your life, so the best thing you can do is use it to help people where you can.”

Her shoulders slumped with an exhausted sigh. “Yes… you’re right, of course. But even though I know that logically, I just feel….”

Yuri nodded. “Me, too. You’ve been up all night, haven’t you? Get some rest. Maybe you’ll feel better when you’re not sleep deprived.”

“Maybe.” She seemed to doubt it. “Thank you for talking with me, Yuri.”

“Hey, any time. Get some sleep.” He squeezed her shoulder and then left her to take a nap. Yuri walked away from her room feeling heavy and sick. Questions about could-haves and should-haves twisted in his gut, and he told himself he’d stop feeling so worked up as soon as he took care of that thing pressing on the back of his mind.

Except - he took a deep breath. There wasn’t anything pressing he had to take care. Yuri ran a hand over his face and through his hair. _What is wrong with me?_

* * *

Yuri didn’t see Estelle again until after lunch. He’d spent the rest of the morning with Karol, Repede, and Judith. A team of researchers had contacted the guild for transportation to the Sands of Kogorh tomorrow, along with protection while they did some kind of archaeological dig. It was nice to have a job lined up, because now whenever Yuri stressed about needing to do something, he had an actual task to fall back on.

In the afternoon, he dropped by Flynn’s office again to let him know about the upcoming mission. He opened the door without knocking and heard Flynn, his voice harder and louder than Yuri had ever heard from him directed at Estelle, saying “…will not waste more of my troops’ lives on a wild goose chase.”

Both of them startled when the door opened and Estelle twisted in the chair with a guilty look that faded when she saw who it was.

“Am I interrupting something?” Yuri looked between Estelle’s flushed cheeks and Flynn’s stern expression and took a moment to reorient his world around the reality that Flynn was apparently comfortable outright arguing with Estelle these days.

“It’s nothing,” Flynn said tersely and looked away.

“It’s not nothing. Yuri, we might have a way to protect people without blastia, but Flynn won’t-”

Flynn interrupted, “Flynn is able to recognize when a letter is either a prank or a trap and isn’t willing to waste resources investigating a false lead.”

Estelle slapped her hand on the back of the chair. “We don’t know it’s a false lead unless we investigate it!”

Yuri crossed the room and spotted the open letter sitting on the desk between them. He grabbed it and felt his friends’ eyes on him as he quickly read it over.

_Dear Commandant Flynn,_

_Greetings. My name is Christabel and I am writing to you from the village of Yewbrooke. You probably have not heard of us; our ancestors chose to leave the Empire and live in peace and solitude many generations ago. We have been content to remain separated from the world at large for many years, but are not blind to it. We, too, saw the calamity in the sky and we are aware that the stones known as blastia were sacrificed to eliminate it. I cannot say I am very knowledgeable about blastia, because in Yewbrooke, we have never used them. Those members of our village who occasionally travel to Zaphias for supplies have brought us stories about the magic rocks that power your society, and I understand that losing them was quite the blow to you. Of note, Zaphias no longer has the glowing barrier that keeps monsters out, and your soldiers are scrambling to keep your cities safe. Is that correct?_

_That is why I am writing to you today. In our village, monsters have never plagued us even though we live in the heart of the southern forest. We have found our own methods for staying safe, and it occurred to me that perhaps our methods could be applied to the rest of Terca Lumireis. I would like to invite you to come to Yewbrooke so that you can learn about our alternatives and hopefully take that knowledge back to share with the rest of your people. We have isolated ourselves from you for too long, and I feel that it is time for us to share what we know. If you want to visit us, follow the southeast road from Zaphias toward the forest. There is a road to our village, although it is not well maintained. It is only used by us. The journey should take approximately three days by foot, or so I’ve been told._

_I look forward to meeting you,_

_Christabel_

Yuri dropped the letter to the desk. “This is what you’re fighting over?”

“We have to at least look into it,” Estelle insisted.

“It’s baseless.” Flynn looked at Estelle rather than Yuri. “This alleged village isn’t in any of our records and there is no mention of what this village’s alternative even is. It’s requesting I walk blindly into the forest and couldn’t more obviously be bait for an ambush.”

“But what if it’s not?!” Estelle, having given up on convincing Flynn, turned her pleading eyes to Yuri. “If there’s even the slightest chance of a solution to protect people without blastia, we have to take it. The possibility of a trap is worth the risk to prevent another Midbell.”

Yuri knew that Flynn was right. The letter was far from convincing and he could smell its fishiness from where it sat on the desk. If ‘Christabel’ was earnestly trying to help, her letter would have outlined what their alternative method was and only suggested someone come to the village if they needed extra help.

But though he knew that in his mind, his heart was with Estelle. They had decided to remove the blastia from the world. No matter how good their intentions had been, they had created this mess that was now killing innocent civilians. They had a duty to do anything in their power to clean it up as soon as possible. And, maybe, fixing the blastia problem would finally put an end to the anxiety that had haunted him since Tarqaron.

Flynn saw Yuri’s face and shook his head. “I don’t care if you team up against me, Yuri. You’re not going to convince me. You have the luxury of working alone, but I have the entire Imperial Knights to worry about. I can’t afford to waste our limited time and resources investigating what is obviously a fool’s errand.”

“Yeah, I get it. You’re right; this is probably a trap.”

Flynn smiled faintly in relief that he wasn’t going to have another argument.

Estelle stood abruptly and started to leave, but paused with her hand on the back of the chair and turned around. “If you were at Midbell, you’d understand.” She stormed out of the room.

Yuri watched her go and then looked back to Flynn, who sighed.

“I hope you don’t think I was being too harsh,” Flynn said.

Yuri shrugged. “You know Estelle. When she puts her mind to something, it takes several levels up from ‘harsh’ to persuade her not to go after it.”

“You do agree with me, though, right? Chasing after this letter is dangerous and foolish. From Brays’ report, I understand that what she witnessed in Midbell was deeply disturbing, but that isn’t a reason to forgo common sense.”

“Yeah. I wouldn’t expect you to risk more knights’ lives chasing after this.” It was, logically, a bad idea. Yuri knew this… but he also knew that his raging nerves would not give him peace if he did nothing while a possible solution lurked in the forest.

That was why, hours later, he knocked softly on Estelle’s bedroom door and pushed it open when he heard a sudden cessation of movement within. Illuminated by a candle on the bedside table, Estelle stood over an open backpack on her bed, shoving food filched from the kitchens into it.

She stared at him, the candlelight gleaming in her defiant eyes. “You can’t stop me, Yuri. I won’t just sit here and wait for another Midbell to happen - not when there’s even the faintest hope of a solution.”

“I know.” Yuri shrugged his shoulder to bring his packed bag into view. “I feel the same way.”

Her defiance broke into a smile. “I’m glad to not be going alone.”

Yuri nodded. At his side, Repede thumped his tail. They were most likely walking in danger, and they probably wouldn’t even be considering this if they were the same comfortable, emotionally stable people who had left Zaphias all those months ago, but this was a quest they both needed to undertake. “Here’s to the road ahead.”


	2. Quiet Village

Yuri, Estelle, and Repede snuck away from Zaphias under cover of nightfall, without fanfare or notice. Yuri had discussed where they were going with Karol and Judith before leaving, because he wasn’t an idiot and wanted people to know where they were going if it was a trap after all. They’d been torn on going with them, but this early in their guild’s career, they couldn’t afford to flake on a contract. Yuri had insisted they leave with their employer, while he and Repede helped Estelle check out this lead.

“It’s kind of weird, leaving like this,” Estelle said once they were out of the city and walking along a road that was little more than a dirt path through a field. “It doesn’t seem like that long ago that the three of us were running away from Zaphias for different reasons. Back when I had no idea who you were and only had Flynn’s word that you weren’t a violent madman.”

“So what do you think of me this time?”

“Well… it turns out, Flynn was wrong. You’re a bit of a violent madman, but you’re our violent madman, so I think that’s ok.”

Yuri laughed, and it was the first genuine laugh he’d had in days. So much stress that had been built up released now that they were on the road. At least, he was doing something again. Maybe he was more like Repede than he’d thought. During weeks of rainy weather, when Repede was cooped up inside all day, the dog got stir crazy. Yuri had been like that while cooped up in Zaphias or Dahngrest, but they were outside and on the road again, and the restlessness that had buzzed inside him since Tarquaron was finally fading.

“It’s good to be on the road again,” he said.

“M-hm. Have you found it… odd, going back to normal life?”

“In what way?”

“Like… for so long, we woke up early and travelled all day, alway working toward some big goal, danger around every corner. And then we got rid of the Adephagos and went home and it all just… stopped. I’m back living in the same bedroom, and yes I have more freedom now but it’s all so… so normal. Except it isn’t normal anymore, not for me.”

Yuri nodded slowly as she spoke. Funny how Estelle had a way of putting all of his own feelings into her own words. Slowly, he said, “How do you go from wielding a sword of pure energy to cut through the apocalypse and reshape the world’s energy one day, and then sit around having drinks with old neighbours who have never left Zaphias a week later?”

“You do know what I mean. I was a round peg living in a round hole, but I went out into the world and experienced so much that I became a little bit square. And now I’m back living in that round hole again, but I don’t quite fit.”

“It’s… a strange feeling, I guess. I set out to save my home, and I did, but I don’t think the lower quarter is my home anymore.” He hadn’t realized just how much he’d changed until trying to fit in with his old neighbours again. He still cared about them, but he just couldn’t relate to them anymore. At some point in his journey, he’d lost the ability to feel concern for drafty windows and noisy neighbours. It all just seemed so petty compared to everything they’d dealt with in the past few months, and he found himself getting irritated with old acquaintances acting like on watered-down-beer at a bar was a level eight on the grand scale of things to be concerned about.

Estelle gazed at the sky, dazzled by the stars. “I liked travelling with you and everyone else. It was the first time I ever truly felt like I belonged.” She smiled a little. “I’m happy to be travelling with you once more. I feel like I’m back in my square hole again.”

“Yeah. It’s good to be working toward a vital goal again.”

Estelle, still transfixed by the sky, said, “You know, I never realized how much light barrier blastia produced. But now that they’re all gone, the stars seem so much brighter.”

“Huh. I guess you’re right.” Yuri didn’t look up, though. He’d gotten into the habit of avoiding glancing at the sky back during the Adephagos and couldn’t shake it. “Seems like losing blastia wasn’t completely horrible.”

* * *

They put as much distance between themselves and Zaphias as they could before stopping for the night. Yuri assumed that Flynn was past the point of chasing after Estelle, but just in case. They set up a basic barrier on the side of the ride and stretched out on sleeping rolls beneath the sky. Repede curled up beside Yuri and it wasn’t long before he heard Estelle’s soft snores. It was funny, but sleeping outside with a rock digging into his back somehow felt like life going back to normal more than sleeping in a castle guest room did.

They continued their journey the next day. With the sun beating down on the plains, Yuri and Estelle enjoyed a casual walk. Yuri found a stick and began throwing it ahead, to let Repede bound before them and then come running back with it. As they walked, they chatted idly about funny stories from their travels, or a interesting book Estelle had read, or - one of their favourite topics - embarrassing stories about Flynn.

They stopped that evening when they reached the base of the plateau, and set up camp with the cliff at their backs. Yuri set up a fire and a basic barrier to ward of monsters and as they fell asleep, Yuri felt that he’d left his stress and worries back in Zaphias.

And then, they came rushing back to him in the night. It was the same old dream he was really starting to tire of, involving various configurations of the Adephagos, a failing Vesperia No. 1, and far too many corpses. No matter how often he woke up and firmly told himself that everything was fine, their plan had worked, and the world wasn’t doomed, he couldn’t stop that little whisper in the dark that asked, but what if?

He awoke with a start and quickly sat up, patting his torso to make sure everything was still there. A few feet away, Estelle poked at the coals of last night’s fire and munched on an apple. Repede was still asleep, or at least pretending to be. Yuri was sure he’d seen an eye open for a second after Yuri woke up.

“Good morning,” Estelle said.

“Morning.” Yuri let out a long breath. At least he’d woken up into clear-headedness this time.

“Were you having a bad dream?”

Yuri’s heart skipped a beat. “No. Why?”

She glanced at him, noting the tension in his voice and obviously feeling guilty for hitting a nerve. “I just… you looked pretty upset just before you woke up. Do you feel ok?”

Yuri shook his head with a forced laugh. “It was nothing. A dumb dream about getting chased by a giant squid.”

“Oh. Ok.” She wasn’t sure if she believed him, but at least she didn’t keep pressing. “I wasn’t going to cook breakfast, but I can rekindle the fire if you want.”

“Nah.” Yuri shook out his hair and stretched. “Just toss me one of those apples.”

Estelle opened the bag and did as asked. For a long minute, there was no sound but crunching as they enjoyed their breakfast.

When Estelle finished, she said, “I had a nightmare last night.”

Yuri looked to her. “Oh?”

“About Midbell.”

“Oh.” When Estelle didn’t go on, he said, “Do you want to talk about it?”

She leaned against the rocky wall of the plateau. “Not really. I think I would rather forget about it, honestly.”

“Heh. Yeah… I’d rather forget about mine, too.”

She gave him a knowing look. “About your ‘giant squid’?”

“Yeah,” he said stubbornly. “It was very alarming. Full of tentacles and suckers and crap.”

“Of course.”

Yuri finished his apple and tossed the core over his shoulder to let it decompose in the wild. “Let’s get going. We should reach the village by the end of today.”

The pair made their way up the plateau and spent the rest of the morning trekking across the field. There wasn’t much of a road to follow up here, but they headed in a general southeast direction and trusted Repede to keep them on the most travelled route. About an hour after stopping for lunch, the expanse of grass began to be peppered by skinny trees. At first the trees were spread apart, each one standing alone above scraggly grass starved of sunlight by the canopy. They kept moving onward, until the trees got closer and closer together and began to provide proper shade. The sun had been making Yuri regret turning down Judith’s earlier offer of a haircut as sweat dripped down the back of his neck, so it was a relief to enter the forest proper and get out of the heat.

The path became more defined here, as it was made of trees and bushes cut back rather than just a worn track in the grass. Here, they moved more slowly, ears alert for sound. Yuri was acutely aware that if this was an ambush they were entering the ideal location for it to be sprung. Repede went ahead of them, sniffing the ground and searching for any sign of armed men lurking in the bushes. The lighthearted banter of the walk before was replaced by tense silence.

Their silence projected into the forest and seemed to echo back at them. No movement came from behind the trees, and the only sound was the light rustling of a breeze through the trees. Yuri’s grip on his sword tightened; there had to be something. Up ahead, Repede still hadn’t alerted them to any sign of a trap.

The grip on his sword began to grow clammy and Yuri felt a familiar tightness seep into his muscles. No, not now…. Like a bowstring drawn taut, Yuri was ready to fire at a moment’s notice.

A large tree sat next to the trail about twenty feet in front of them. His mind supplied the image of a man leaping out from behind it and thrusting his sword into Estelle’s chest before any of them could react. Repede had already past the tree and seen nothing, so of course that wouldn’t happen. But what if…? Someone could have been hiding in the bushes by the tree and Repede missed them. They were going to leap out and attack Estelle. The image of a sword sinking into her and splattering blood all down her chest played over and over in his mind no matter how hard he tried to dispel it, so real and vivid that he could almost smell the blood.

I’m being stupid, he told himself furiously. No, it wasn’t him being stupid, it was his piece of shit brain that wouldn’t stop yelling about armed brigands murdering Estelle right in front of him. The danger was so close, that tree only five feet away now, and his heart ached from tension. He put out his arm, pushing Estelle behind himself, to protect her from the imminent threat.

“Yuri, what-?”

He saw movement. Tension released outward and he swung his sword at the threat, which turned out to be a falling leaf. The bisected leaf hit the ground, Yuri panted, and Repede ran down the trail to rejoin them.

Yuri locked his eyes on the leaf, heart still racing, hands still shaking. He wanted to throw up. What an idiot he’d been to panic so much over a leaf, but that just meant the real attack was still coming. He never should have let Estelle come on this journey. Flynn was right; it was an obvious trap and he’d causally led Estelle right into it. She was going to be killed - the picture of her murder resumed its incessant repetition - and it would be all his fault.

Yuri could no longer hold back the wave of dread that caused him to drop his sword. Estelle said his name, but he barely registered it. All he knew was that both of them were going to be murdered in this forest and he would have to watch Estelle die horribly because of his own dumb mistake. He shook, struggling to regain control of his breathing. Any second now, the ambush would arrive and he couldn’t even protect Estelle in this state! That thought worsened his panic and his lungs went into overdrive. Oxygen came in and out so quickly it didn’t have time to help him and he felt dizzy, nauseous, and on the brink of sobbing over Estelle’s imminent death.

“Yuri, what’s wrong?”

He looked to Estelle, the movement seeming unbearable slow as his brain processed everything in fight-or-flight mode. “I’m… fine,” he muttered.

“You’re clearly not! Sit down.” She grabbed his arm and he didn’t resist as she pulled him down.

Sitting helped with the light-headedness, but did nothing for the agony of impending doom. Estelle rested her hands on his shoulders and squeezed. “You’re breathing really fast. Try to slow down. Match me, ok?”

Yuri watched her slowly take in a deep breath and then let it out. The next time she breathed in, Yuri gasped and ended up choking on his breath to keep from exhaling too quickly and shallowly. This at least succeeded in interrupting the frantic tempo of breathing, and made it easier to match her deep inhale the next time around.

After a few more breaths like this and focusing all his energy on her face, the terror began to subside. In all the time he’d been sitting here freaking out, a sitting duck, no one had jumped out at them. Estelle was fine, he was fine, and Repede - sitting next to him with a worried expression - was fine. He took one last deep breath and then pressed a hand over his face.

“I’m fine.”

“Are you calming down now?”

“Yeah.”

Estelle let go of him and leaned back, but remained crouched hesitantly in front of him. “Um… are you alright?”

Yuri took a moment to sit with his eyes closed, breathe evenly, and let his heart return to normal. It didn’t, but it was better than the raging throb of before. “Yeah. Sorry for worrying you.” He dropped his hand and stood. Repede whined and Yuri rubbed his head absently.

Estelle rose as well. Softly, as if afraid of startling him, she said, “Was that the first time you’ve had a panic attack?”

Yuri strongly considered lying, but Estelle deserved the truth. Still looking at Repede, he said, “No.”

“How long have you… I mean, when did they…?”

Yuri sighed. “Estelle, I’m sorry, but I honestly don’t want to talk about this right now.”

“Oh… I understand. Sorry.”

“Let’s go. It looks like if this is a trap, they’re not ambushing us at the entrance to the forest.”

They carried on, deeper into the woods. Yuri tried to bounce back, but he’d spent so much energy panicking earlier that he now felt drained. On top of that was his embarrassment that Estelle had seen him freak out like that, and his frustration that these episodes were happening in the first place. He spent the rest of the walk in stormy silence.

They continued along the path for a few hours, heading deeper and deeper into the forest. If not for the path, Yuri would have been certain the letter was a hoax and there was nothing in these woods but endless trees. This path had to lead somewhere, though.

He wondered why anyone would choose to live so deep in a forest. Yuri was a city boy at heart and found seas of trees disconcerting. A warren of alleys in the lower quarter didn’t bother him, but he always felt that stepping off the path in a forest like this was akin to falling overboard. Every tree blended together and it wouldn’t be hard to get turned around in the abundance of nature. He was especially uncomfortable today, since the panic attack at the entrance of the woods had left him jumpy and on edge. Every bird song made his ears strain and it seemed like every eye in the forest was watching them.

As the sun began to set, the back of Yuri’s neck prickled with the thought that they were going to have to camp for the night in this forest. Sleeping out on the plains had been one thing, but here, they couldn’t see an enemy coming until it was too late. Who knew what lurked among the trees? They stuck up from the ground like gnarled fingers and the late spring canopy was dense enough to block all but the faintest traces of dusk’s light. Yuri’s chest tightened and the image of wolves mauling them to death in the night filled his brain. They were so exposed here, so unprotected from the horrible creatures lying in wait.

Yuri’s skin crawled as he stared into the shadows and imagined something lurking there. It was the imaginary attacked behind the tree all over again, but his edgy mind stoked the fear in his heart just the same. They shouldn’t have come to this forest. There was something there, something waiting for them, and Estelle was going to be horribly killed and his throat was clamping up and -

Repede barked and ran on ahead. Estelle called after him and began to run, spurring Yuri to abandon his fixation on nothing and go after them. They both disappeared around a bend in the path, and Yuri skidded on detritus in his eagerness to keep them in sight.

“Yuri, watch-!”

His face smacked into a rope that sent his neck snapping back. He stumbled back, clutching his nose and cursing.

“…Out.” Estelle had stopped on the path to examine the rope.

“Who the hell put a rope at face-level over the path?” Yuri grumbled and looked to the trees. It wasn’t just one rope, he saw. More ropes stretched out from the trees, leading away from the path in long curves. Hanging from the ropes were rectangles of white paper, each the size of his hand and covered with writing in a language he didn’t recognize. They dangled from the rope, spaced out by a few feet.

Repede barked again, and Yuri put the strange papers out of his mind to hurry onward. Estelle let go of the paper she’d been inspecting to follow him. They rounded a boulder and discovered that at least one thing about the letter had been correct: there was an entire village nestled away in this forest.

The overgrown forest abruptly turned into a cultivated vegetable patch as the suffocating trees gave way to a clearing. The vegetable patch sat beside a squat stone house with a crooked chimney jutting out of a messy shingled roof. Just ahead on the path, Repede wagged his tail as a cluster of small children fawned over him.

When Yuri came closer, the boy nearest him noticed that Repede hadn’t come alone and startled back. His reaction prompted the others to look as well, and Yuri saw fear duplicated five times.

He put on his most disarming smile. “Hi, there. Have we found -?”

The kids didn’t let him finish before scampering down the road. The road led past more gardens and houses to a cluster of large buildings up ahead. The forest surrounded the village to the left and right, but ahead, the ground sloped downward and he could only see the tops of trees some distance away. He’d heard water earlier, and wondered if there was a river.

“It’s really here.” Estelle stopped beside him. “I was so afraid the letter would be a hoax and I’d put all my hopes on nothing.”

“Don’t get too hopeful yet. Yewbrooke might exist, but we still don’t know if they really have a blastia alternative, or if it’s something we could use.”

“Right. I know. Let’s go find out then, shall we?”

Yuri, Repede, and Estelle continued down the path and into the village. Yuri was grateful to be out from under the shade of the trees. The Quoi Woods might be rumoured to be cursed, but he’d felt more uncomfortable in these woods than any they’d travelled through on their journey.

They walked down the dirt road lined in cottages. The houses were made of wood or stone, with thatch roofs and plenty of space between them for individual crop fields on the surrounding land. The road ended in a broad plaza, where residents were starting to gather. On one side of the plaza was the largest building in town as far as Yuri could see. It had two storeys and a grand double-door, which opened as Yuri and Estelle reached the plaza. A middle aged man and a girl around Estelle’s age walked down the step.

Yuri came to a halt and met the two people halfway across the square. The rest of the village crowded around the edges, quiet save for murmurs among themselves. The man was a little shorter than Yuri, with thin, greying hair and lines around his eyes. Yuri expected him to greet them, but instead the girl stepped forward with a warm smile.

“Welcome.” Her deep green dress was stained with mud along the hem and adorned with a simple lacing up the chest. The only jewellery she wore was a pewter pendant, which turned out to be a coin when Yuri looked closer. It wasn’t a gald, so he assumed it was either very old or very far away from its home. Someone had punched a hole in the edge so that a braided cord could be tied around it. Smiling at Yuri, she said, “I assume you are Flynn Scifo? I’m so glad you came.”

Estelle glanced at him and Yuri wondered if she was also remembering the last time they’d started a journey with a stranger assuming Yuri was Flynn. Luckily, this girl seemed a lot more level-headed than Zagi and he hoped he would have better luck explaining this time, “No, actually, but Flynn is a good friend of mine. My name is Yuri Lowell, and this is Estelle.”

“I hope that’s ok,” Estelle quickly put in. “Flynn wasn’t sure if he wanted to come, but Yuri and I knew we had to investigate.”

“Of course it’s fine,” she said. “My name is Christabel; I am the princess of Yewbrooke and the one who wrote the letter. It’s my pleasure to welcome you to our village.”

Princess, huh? Yuri wondered if Ioder knew someone was claiming a royal title within land nominally part of the Empire.

The man spoke up. “I’m Menteith Gower, mayor of our town. Christabel warned me you might be coming. We don’t get visitors often, but I hope our hospitality meets your expectations.”

Christabel added, “You must be tired from your journey. You can stay in the Great House while you’re here. Come with me; we were just getting ready for supper.”

Yuri’s stomach growled appreciatively at the mention of supper and he followed Christabel and Mayor Gower into the building. The architecture was simple, with stone walls and exposed beams. He supposed they didn’t have anyone to show off to, being so isolated. The smell of cooking food wafted through the main entrance and Yuri fought the urge to go straight to it and eat right in the kitchen. They walked up a curved wooden staircase and then to a room at the back of the building.

Christabel pushed open the door to reveal a bedroom. “This is the only guest room we have in Yewbrooke. I’m sorry; I hope you don’t mind sharing. Estelle, if you’d rather, you could share my room.”

“It’s not a problem at all.” She set her bag on the floor in front of one of the twin beds. “Yuri and I have shared a room plenty of times.”

“Oh! I’m sorry, I didn’t even think - we could push the beds together so you can share?”

Yuri laughed as Estelle startled.

“No!” Estelle waved her hands. “It’s not like that at all! I just meant - Yuri and I - we’re just -”

“We’ve travelled together a lot,” Yuri said. “We’re just friends, but we’re used to having just one room for ourselves and our other companions.”

“I see.” Christabel appeared amused by Estelle’s embarrassed expression. Then she smiled, fidgeted, and looked over her shoulder down the hall. “Supper will be ready really soon. You can get settled here and come down whenever you’re ready. But, Yuri, um….” She fiddled with the coin around her neck and avoided looking at him. “I think it would be best if you buttoned your shirt up.”

“Huh?”

“It’s inappropriate to dress so scandalously,” she said in a rush. “I’m sorry, but as princess it’s my duty to tell you that you won’t be well-received dressing like that.”

Yuri absently tugged at the sweaty collar of his shirt. “It’s hot as f- really hot outside. I don’t wanna button it up to my neck.”

“Don’t make a fuss, Yuri,” Estelle said quietly. “It is rather rude to show up as guests at a dinner and ignore the dress code.”

“Well… alright, fine, if it’s that important to you.” He scowled at his shirt as he began buttoning it up.

“Thank you for understanding,” Christabel said. “Supper is in the big room just past the staircase off the main hall. I’ll see you in a few minutes.”

After the door was closed, Yuri finished buttoning the second-to-the-top button and shared a look with Estelle. Repede curled up at the foot of Yuri’s bed and yawned. Estelle said, “It still doesn’t feel real that this town actually exists.”

“I know what you mean.” Yuri walked across the wooden floor to the windowed-door on the far wall. He stepped onto a small balcony, which had a twin on the other side of the building. From here, he had a view of more wooden cottages spread out along a dirt road until the wall of trees cut them off. Yuri rested a hand on the wrought-iron railing that was still warm from baking in the sun earlier. There were no walls as far as he could see. No fences or anything that might have been a barrier blastia. And yet, the village was peaceful. None of the people heading back to their homes were armed and meeting children at the entrance implied parents weren’t afraid to let their kids wander. What did this town do to keep the monsters out, and how could a place like Midbell do the same? “What do you think their blastia alternative is? Do you think it has something to do with those ropes we saw coming in?”

Estelle sat on the bed nearest to the balcony. “I wonder. They must mean something. I don’t think those pieces of paper were just for decoration, but it wasn’t like anything I’ve ever read about.” She covered her mouth as she yawned. “I’m really hungry. Are you ready to go down?”

Yuri’s stomach growled at the promise of food. “Definitely. It smells amazing.” He sniffed the air and his mouth watered at the scent of rappig. He took a minute to splash some water on his face from the basin on the dresser and then followed Estelle down the stairs toward the dining room Christabel had pointed out.

The dining room had a long table and a low fire in a hearth at the end. This seemed unnecessary, because even though night had fallen, it was still warm outside. Christabel sat at the head of the table, Mayor Gower to her right, and then there were five others Yuri didn’t know.

“Hello!” Christabel said. “You can sit in the empty places there. And also, let me introduce Messala, Thaisa, Ursula, Ford, and Dion.” She gestured to the other diners who waved as their name was called. “They work in the Great House. Messala is the one to thank for cooking this delicious meal.”

Yuri’s eyes darted over the group and he couldn’t help but ask, “The servants eat with you?”

Christabel glanced to Gower for a confused second and then she looked back to Yuri. “Yes? Where else would they eat? This is the dining room.”

“Huh.” Yuri had known a handful of people who got jobs as servants in noble houses, and they had certainly never sat down with the family at dinner time.

Estelle took a seat across from Gower at one of two places left open, but Yuri hesitated. “Is there any food in the kitchen I can give my dog?”

Christabel jumped up. “Oh, right! Come with me.”

Yuri followed her through a door to a kitchen that was the source of all the good smells.

“We don’t have designated dog food, so I hope your dog doesn’t mind eating meat.” She sliced off a few cuts from the rappig on the counter.

“I think you’re going to make a new best friend if you give him that.”

“Here, take this up to him.” She pressed the plate into his hands. “We’ll wait for you.”

Yuri thanked her and took the plate up to Repede. He wondered why Christabel had been the one to get the food for him. Was she not a princess? He couldn’t imagine servants letting Estelle jump up from the dinner table to take care of a dog.

Upstairs, he found Repede sitting by the door to the balcony and looking out to the woods. “I got food for you.”

Repede’s ears perked at the mention of food and he looked over his shoulder. Yuri carried the plate to him and set it by the door.

“What are you looking at?” Yuri stared into the trees that had captured Repede’s attention. Long shadows of twilight reached into the village like fingers from the dark woods. The leaves swayed in the breeze, while smoke rose from the chimneys of the cottages. “Weird little town. Reminds me of Yormgen, don’t you think?”

Repede was too busy snarfing up the plate of roasted rappig to comment. Not for the first time, Yuri wished Repede could talk to him - really talk. He liked to think he understood the dog pretty well, but there was a difference between knowing from his body language that Repede felt unsettled about this town, and being told exactly what had him on edge.

Yuri returned downstairs. This place really did remind him of Yormgen. The lack of blastia, the princess outside of the Empire, and the general insularity of it was too similar to the time bubble. He was pretty sure they would have noticed if they had travelled back in time on the road to the village, so Yuri didn’t think that was the case here… but he really wasn’t sure. In the dining room, he took a seat next to Estelle. There was already a plate waiting for him loaded with food and his stomach roared with delight.

“Sorry about holding you guys up.”

“It’s no trouble,” Gower said with a smile.

“Well then,” Christabel looked around the assembled diners, “let’s begin.”

Yuri picked up his fork and immediately began slicing a piece of rappig for himself. Seeing Repede eat had just made him more eager to have some for himself. He had just put the first bite in his mouth when Estelle nudged him in the ribs. He closed his mouth, lowered the fork, and looked around to see the rest of the table staring at him. They all sat with their hands folded on the table. A few of them seemed scandalized.

Dammit, he’d done something wrong. Was it important? Was the food poisoned? Were they in danger? They were probably in danger. “Uh. Sorry.” His hand slid closer to his knife, ready to grab it and defend himself and Estelle if anything happened.

Christabel reached for a cut of rappig on the platter in the middle of the table. She picked the meat up with her fingers and carried it toward the hearth. Once there, she turned to face the table, where everyone was focused on her. “We thank the rappig for its sacrifice so that we may be fed.”

The gathered table murmured, “Thank you.”

Yuri let himself relax somewhat. It seemed he had merely interrupted a religious ceremony. Nothing was going to happen to them.

“And we thank the Crukh for providing.”

“Thank you,” the table echoed. Yuri and Estelle joined in this time, not sure what was happening but wanting to appear polite.

Christabel tossed the meat into the coals and Yuri barely suppressed a wince. He had to force his deep-seated loathing of seeing food wasted from blurting out something rude.

After Christabel returned to the table, everyone reached for the cutlery and began to eat. Yuri cut another piece for himself, but his eyes kept going back to the slice of smoldering meat quickly burned in the embers. The smell of burnt meat tinged the background of the room, but no one else acted like anything unusual had happened.

“Why did you throw a piece of meat into the fire?” Estelle asked.

“Hm?” Gower looked confused. “That as the standard offering of thanks. Do you not have a similar ritual in Zaphias?”

“No.” Yuri finished chewing, swallowed, and said, “Where I come from, food is treasured and hard to come by. We don’t throw away anything.” He tried to keep the judgement out of his voice, but it was hard. This wasn’t as bad as the waste he saw at the castle, but it still irritated him to see people casually throw food away when he’d grown up surrounded by starving people.

“Food is not hard to come by here,” Christabel said. “And we have the Crukh to thank for that. Offering a little bit of the bounty back to him is the least we can do to repay him.”

Estelle tilted her head with interest. “Who is this Crukh person?”

“The Crukh is the guardian of these woods,” Christabel explained. “He is the reason we have no need for blastia. He keeps the monsters out, fertilizes our crops, cleans our water, keeps out sickness, and ensures health and prosperity for all residents.”

Yuri had a sinking feeling that summoning them here to learn about how to keep monsters out without blastia was an excuse to proselytize to them and try to spread worship of their Crook god outside the forest. “That’s all it is? Your amazing trick for keeping out monsters is prayer?”

The rest of the table have him unhappy looks.

“I’m sure it’s more than that,” Estelle said. “You’ve have been living here for ages and haven’t had any trouble with monsters. What about those ropes around town?”

“Those are the barrier markers,” Christabel explained. “They enclose the village and demarcate it as protected ground, and tell the Crukh which land to keep safe.”

Yuri tried to work this out. “The ropes are what keep monsters out? So… do you treat them with something scented or is there a natural repellent in the area, maybe?”

“There is nothing of the sort,” Gower said. “Our only protection is the Crukh. We owe him our lives.” The rest of the table nodded in sage agreement.

This place, Yuri concluded, was decidedly weird.


	3. A Quiet Village

Yuri and Estelle maintained polite conversation throughout dinner. The villagers had never had visitors before and were fascinated to hear stories about the outside world.

Christabel in particular listened hungrily as Yuri tried to describe Zaphias. He told her about the tiers of the city rising up the hill; long, paved boulevards; buildings that towered overhead; the castle at the pinnacle that could be seen throughout the city; the way the barrier used to illuminate the night sky; and a hundred other details.

“It’s so hard to imagine,” she said when he finished. “I always thought the Great House was huge, but it must feel tiny to you.”

“Not really.” Yuri shrugged. “Zaphias has a lot of grand buildings, but I grew up in the lower quarter. It looked a lot more like this village, but without the vegetable gardens.”

One of the servant women, Messala, asked, “Then where did you acquire food from?”

Yuri gave a humourless laugh. “That’s what we tried to figure out every day.”

The villagers exchanged shocked glances and gazed at Yuri with pity and horror. Yuri shifted uncomfortably at the attention and focused on his rappig.

“You mean you didn’t have regular food?” Christabel asked, as if this concept was foreign to her.

“Well… sort of. Food is expensive, so when money is running low we stretch it as far as we can. Skipping lunch, eating smaller meals, things like that. Sometimes I’d skip meals so younger kids could eat more, like adults did for me when I was little.” It was so odd to have to explain the concept of food scarcity to someone when it had been Yuri’s life for twenty years.

Mayor Gower frowned heavily. “Truly, I did not realize the situation in the outside was so dire.”

“That must be so hard,” Christabel said. “And to have travelled so far to visit us with so few rations! We can add more to your plates, if you desire. You must be so hungry!”

“Oh, no.” Estelle waved her hands. “We had plenty of food on the trail here, don’t worry. Yuri has been staying with me in Zaphias castle and we have plenty of food.”

“Oh, thank goodness,” Christabel said. “The food scarcity problem has ended, then?”

“Not exactly.” Yuri had a feeling he knew what piece of the puzzle the villagers hadn’t discovered yet and wasn’t looking forward to giving it to them. “The lower quarter is still starving. The castle has never been starving.”

“I don’t understand,” Dion, another servant, said while looking at Estelle. “Why did you have food in the castle but Yuri didn’t in the lower quarter?”

“Well… because… I’m a princess….”

Yuri was too late to elbow her to tell her to keep her mouth shut. He hadn’t wanted to tell them exactly who Estelle was just yet - not before they knew if these people were the sort to look for hostages.

“I’m a princess, too,” Christabel said. “But I don’t have any more food than anyone else in Yewbrooke does.”

“That’s the way things are in the outside,” Yuri said. “There’s only so much food to go around. You acquire food with money. Those who have more money have more food. The royal family has the most money and the most food. Those who live in poverty are out of luck.”

The villagers exchanged horrified looks and Christabel murmured, “That sounds awful.”

Estelle awkwardly poked at her dinner. “It… um, it really isn’t fair.”

Gower wielded his fork like a baton, waving his hand as he spoke. “Could you not take the food in the castle kitchen and deliver it to the lower quarter?”

All eyes were on Estelle, whose cheeks were pink and face was filled with embarrassment. “I - I suppose - I never thought of -”

“There would be a big drop in lifestyle,” Yuri said. “Most people in the castle aren’t willing to give up on that. If you took all the food available in Zaphias and distributed it equally, the rich folks wouldn’t be able to have their feasts and delicacies. Sucks for the lower quarter, but they aren’t willing to give up that luxury.”

Another servant, Dion, made an ‘a-ha’ sound. “I get it. Your fields can’t feed all of you heartily, so you must sacrifice a segment of the population so that at least some can prosper. This is difficult for us to understand, because in Yewbrooke, there is enough food for all, with even more to spare.”

Gower nodded. “We should truly be grateful for living here with the Crukh and all that he provides.”

Yuri had only heard about this ‘Crukh’ at the start of dinner, but he was already getting tired of it.

“Why do you live here?” Estelle asked, eager to move the conversation on. “What led your ancestors to building a village out here in the first place?”

“It was the Great Catastrophe,” Gower said. “The story has been passed down from one generation to the next for hundreds of years.”

“Do you mean the Adephagos?” Estelle asked. She’d finished her dinner and now sat with her hands politely folded in her lap.

“I do not know what your culture calls it. They say that long ago, the sky ripped open and an evil force attempted to destroy the world.”

Estelle bobbed her head. “The Adephagos.”

Gower glanced at her, annoyed that she’d interrupted his story. “Yes, we call it the Great Catastrophe. In those days, our ancestors lived in the outside world. They saw how the folly of their rulers led to the Catastrophe. Afterwards, the Kritya abandoned blastia and retreated into the sky, but humans did not see the error in their ways. The emperor who stepped up among the human civilizations said they were foolish and paranoid and established his new dynasty using blastia as a power source. But our ancestors were wise, and looked to the Kritya for guidance. We fled the kingdom, but were not allowed to live freely. No matter where we tried to set up a community, the kingdom - which would later declare itself the Empire - reached us and attempted to push their blastia onto us. To escape, we fled into the forest. On the first night, we feared the fading of the light and thought that monsters would surely attack. But it wasn’t monsters who approached our ancestors that night - it was the Crukh. He reached out to us and promised us sanctuary in his forest, so we travelled deep into the heart of his territory and established our village here. For every generation since, we have lived here in peace and prosperity, knowing not sickness, nor hunger, nor grief. For that, we thank the Crukh.”

“Thank you,” the villagers around the table murmured.

Yuri and Estelle shared a quick, unnerved glance.

When dinner was over, they bade their hosts goodnight and headed to their room upstairs. Just before entering their room, Christabel dashed up the stars to catch them. She leaned on the wall and panted, “Wait… sorry….”

Estelle cocked her head. “Is something the matter?”

Christabel gulped a breath so she could speak normally. “It’s nothing wrong. I just forgot to tell you something important.”

“Alright, spill,” Yuri said.

“There’s a balcony in your room. It’s lovely to sit outside on a sunny afternoon, but you must not go outside after sunset.”

Yuri and Estelle exchanged concerned glances. Yuri said, “Uh… why?”

“The day is for us, but the night belongs to the Crukh. We stay indoors out of respect for him.”

“What… always?” Yuri didn’t bother trying not to look baffled at their traditions. “What if there’s an emergency at night?”

Christabel looked confused. “What sort of emergency?”

“Medical? What if someone gets sick?”

Christabel slowly shook her head. “That doesn’t happen here. If an elder falls gravely in the middle of the night, that means it is the Crukh’s will that they have reached the end of their life.” She looked between their confused faces and said, “I see that this is foreign to you. It’s ok, though, you don’t have to understand our ways to follow them, right? Just, please keep your door closed overnight for the sake of our traditions.”

“Right…. Good night, then.”

“Good night!” She smiled and retreated to her own room.

A fleeting sense of relief hit Yuri when he closed their door, seeming to shut the rest of the village out. Repede was already asleep, curled up tightly in the space between the two beds. After getting ready for bed, Yuri had to step over him to get to his bed and wondered why Repede had chosen to sleep in this cramped space and not spread out on the soft rug by the balcony door.

“So.” Yuri leaned against the headboard on top of the covers; it was too warm to snuggle under them. “What do you think?”

Estelle, lying on her side beneath a sheet, said, “Yewbrooke is certainly… interesting.”

“’Interesting’, yeah. Do you want to open the door to let a breeze in? I’m sweating here.”

“We can’t. Christabel just said we had to keep the door shut at night.”

Yuri rolled his eyes. “That’s just their weird village tradition. You really want to keep to it?”

Estelle hesitated and then said, “Well… I think we should for tonight, at least. Until we know more about the village. Maybe it started as a tradition because really awful mosquitoes came out at night.”

“Huh, that’s a good point. Alright, we’ll keep it shut tonight. I really want to know what this Crook guy is all about, though.”

“Crukh,” Estelle corrected. “And I guess it’s some sort of god they worship. I wonder if the site of their village has particularly fertile crops or naturally wards away monsters for some reason, and they attribute this to their god.”

“That was my idea. I hope it’s not just the location, though, because that doesn’t give us anything to take back to Zaphias.”

“Yeah…. Tomorrow, I want to investigate those papers on the ropes we passed on the way here. They must have some kind of enchantment.”

“It’s probably our best bet.”

“And… Yuri, speaking of our trip here….” She propped herself up on her elbow.

Yuri’s heart skipped a beat; he knew where she was going with this.

“The - the, um, attack you had. Has that been happening a lot?”

Yuri folded his arms behind his head and gazed at the wooden beams of the ceiling. “It’s not something for you to worry about.”

“But I do. Are you alright? Is there anything I can do?”

Yuri would rather get his teeth pulled than talk about this with Estelle. “It’s nothing. I’d rather not talk about it.”

“Ok. Well… goodnight, Yuri.”

“Night.” What bothered him even more than the fact that he’d had a panic attack this morning was the thought that if he had been right and there had been an ambush at the entrance of the forest, he would have been useless in a fight. How ever he supposed to protect Estelle when he was clutching his head and struggling to breathe? He’d previously had an attack like that while walking down the street in Zaphias a few weeks ago, and there hadn’t even been anything to trigger it, as far as he knew. If they could come at him out of nowhere, who was to say it wouldn’t happen in the middle of a battle?

The only thing that mattered was protecting his friends. He’d almost lost Estelle once; he couldn’t bear to face that again. Being prepared to take up a sword for her at a moment’s notice was the only way to be sure she was safe, but if he could be taken out of commission at any time for any reason, he wasn’t prepared. The weight of this stress mingled with the room’s heat to press on his chest, smothering him. With nothing else to do, he closed his eyes and hoped his head was clearer tomorrow.

* * *

Estelle shook him awake. “Yuri?”

Yuri bolted upright and yanked his sword out of his sheath. He slept with it leaning against the nightstand, a habit a picked up while camping on the road. He couldn’t sleep now if it wasn’t within reach. His heart hammered in his throat as he squinted into the shadows of the room to find the enemy. The fact that he hadn’t found it yet made every muscle tense. It had been almost five seconds now, and that was enough time for Estelle to have been-

“It’s ok!” Estelle said in a loud whisper. Her hand was pulled back, afraid to touch him and set him off.

“Oh.” Yuri lowered his sword. He focused on Estelle now, though it was hard to make out any details on her face with how dark it was. “Bad dream?” It had been a while since Estelle had woken him up due to a nightmare. She had never done it intentionally, but he was a light sleeper and more than a few times in the weeks after rescuing her from Alexei, he’d woken up to her muffled sniffling and choked sobs in the middle of the night.

“Well… sort of. I did wake up from a dream, but I rolled over to see if you were awake and… I thought I saw something on the balcony.”

Yuri immediately looked there. It was too dark to see anything but the faintest outline of the railing silhouetted against the ever-so-slightly less dark sky. Repede, who had by now woken up, followed his gaze. “What sort of thing?”

“It was… more person-shaped than anything else, but too large to be a person. I think, anyway. I only saw it for a second, because I gasped and blinked to clear my eyes, and it was gone.”

“Could have just been a lingering thought from the dream.”

“I know. I’m sorry, that’s probably what it was, but it seemed so real, and then after I looked again, I couldn’t make out any shadow that might have confused me at all. I’m sorry for waking you, I just… wasn’t sure what to do.”

Yuri grabbed his sword again. “What was it doing?”

“Just… standing there. Like… like it was staring through the window at us.” Estelle hugged herself and shuddered.

Yuri got to his feet slowly. He was still wound like a jack-in-the-box after the abrupt awakening. It was probably some village kids trying to spook them, or else spying on the foreigners as a dare. He’d need to be careful not to hurt a kid by letting all this tension lash out without thought.

When he reached the door, Estelle said, “Wait. We’re not supposed to go outside.”

Yuri looked back at her by the bed. “Yeah, well, someone else was, right? I want to know who it was.”

Repede was still standing at the bed, too. He stared fixedly at the door with his tail low and ears back. The tension in Yuri’s muscles expanded to his chest, making it feel heavy with dread. Repede wouldn’t be acting like this if it had just been a kid lurking outside. He didn’t even want to approach the door, and that made Yuri reluctant to get any closer, too. But Estelle was still standing behind the bed, just as anxious as Repede, and he needed to reassure her that nothing was out there.

He really hoped nothing was out there.

Yuri braced himself and swung the door open. A warm breeze washed over him and trees in the distance rustled. “Who’s out here?” Yuri stepped onto the balcony, ready to strike at anything that moved.

Dread flowed over him, heavy and and cloying. The balcony was only a few square feet, so a quick glance was enough to prove no one was here, but that didn’t stop Yuri from feeling a certainty deep in his gut that he was not safe out there. His breathing came a little quicker. This was how he had felt when they entered the forest, he reminded himself. There had been nothing there, remember? This was equally as baseless. He knew this, but he also knew down to his bones that something more than simple darkness flowed through the night. He felt it all around him, turning his nerves into a horrible certainty that if he stayed out there one minute longer, it would gobble him up.

Yuri backed into the room and shut the door. He had to wait until he could stop shaking before turning to face Estelle. Voice forcibly calm, he said, “Nothing out there. Must have been a trick of the light.”

Repede whined. Estelle said, “Yuri? Are you ok?”

“Huh? Yeah, I’m fine.” He was glad for the darkness in the room, which felt so much thinner than the darkness out there. She couldn’t see how rattled he surely looked.

“There was nothing out there at all?”

“Nope. You must have just had a weird dream that bled into being awake.”

“I guess so….” She looked to Repede, also seeing his tension, also knowing it meant all was not well.

Yuri returned to his bed and tried not to feel soo grateful to put space between himself and the outside. “If it makes you feel better, I’ll stay awake for a little while.”

“Oh, no! I couldn’t ask you to do that.”

“It’s fine.” He plopped on his bed as casually as he could manage. “I’m wide awake now, anyway.” And he didn’t think he could go back to sleep right now anyway.

“Ok….”

She pulled the sheet back on her bed and clearly deliberated her twin desires to curl under a sheet for protection from monsters and to lie on top of the covers for protection fro overheating. Yuri found it gratifying that she seemed to find him standing guard protection enough, and made herself comfortable on top of the sheet. She still trusted him to protect her, but would she if she knew how precariously he was dancing on the edge of panic? His heart still pounded like he was facing down a giganto monster and he felt as if a moment’s weakness in his defenses would send him crashing into full-out panic.

There had been nothing outside, he furiously told himself. He had just gotten spooked by the darkness. Repede had probably picked up the tension Yuri and Estelle projected and become anxious over that. There was nothing out there, so he really needed to calm down.

* * *

The next morning, Yuri was groggy from a night of minimal sleep. He didn’t remember falling asleep, but he must have because awoke from dreams about running through a dark forest. Even as he made his way downstairs for breakfast, he couldn’t shake the urge to keep running from whatever had been behind him.

Christabel, Estelle, and Repede were already in the kitchen. Christabel gave him a cheery, “Good morning!”

“Mm. Got coffee?”

“Coffee…?” Christabel looked perplexed before saying, “Oh! Yes, I’ve heard of that. I’m sorry, we don’t have any coffee in Yewbrooke.”

Yuri stared at her in a half-asleep stupor as the words sank in. “This place just keeps getting better and better.” He glowered at the apple juice in a pitcher on the counter and sulked over it while Estelle and Christabel chatted.

“I meant to ask you,” Estelle was saying, “but I thought I saw a person outside on our balcony last night. You don’t know what that might have been, do you?”

“A person?” Christabel slowly shook her head. “No, you must have imagined it. No one would have been out last night.”

“How certain are you?” Yuri asked. “Maybe not everyone is as passionate about following the rules as you are.”

“Nobody would have,” Christabel said. “Nobody goes out after dark. We just… don’t.”

Yuri couldn’t think of an argument to that. She clearly felt it was a law as core to their life here as not murdering. Obviously that didn’t mean no one did it, but Yuri at least believed it hadn’t been a kid snooping. Of course, the idea that it was a person who willingly defied a sacred law just to spy on them didn’t fill Yuri with any confidence.

“Is there anywhere I can learn more about your town?” Estelle asked. “A library, maybe?”

“There’s a small library in the great house,” Christabel said. “But, I don’t think it would help. We use a different writing system here. I had to study the few foreign books we have to write the letter to Commandant Flynn.”

“Oh, that’s too bad,” Estelle said. “We speak the same language, though. Is the writing that different?”

“It’s just a different alphabet,” Christabel said. “I was told as a child that long ago, all humans wrote in our alphabet, but the humans of the empire started using the Krityan script to make relations with them easier. Our people were against that and continued using the traditional script.”

Estelle’s eyes lit up with a face that said she was about to get side-tracked by a historical anecdote. “That’s fascinating! It’s true that our alphabet originated in the Geraios civilization, and both Krityan and human alphabets have drifted from that since then to account for the slight differences in the modern versions, but I hadn’t heard that a group remained that still used the old one! I’ve never been able to find records of what our ancient writing system looked like! Do you think I could-”

“Estelle.” Yuri rested a hand on her shoulder. “We’re here to research the blastia problem, remember? Not to do a dissertation on alphabets.”

“Ah… well, yes, you’re right. I’m sorry.” She smiled sheepishly. “Christabel, do you think I can look at the library this evening anyway? Just out of curiosity?”

“Sure, I can’t see any harm in that.”

“Can we check out the barrier around the town first?” Yuri asked. He hadn’t slept well, and decided to blame his lingering uneasiness on that. He wanted to get home to Zaphias so he could have a proper sleep, and told himself that was his primary reason for wanting to get out of this town as soon as possible.

“Yes, of course. I’ll take you over to see them.”

The three humans and Repede left the great house and made their way down the dirt road to the edge of town. All the way, faces kept peeping though windows to watch them go.

“I hope you aren’t offended,” Christabel after another curtain snapped shut when Yuri looked its way. “Visitors are just so rare in Yewbrooke. Everyone is a little nervous.”

“Sure, I get it.” They passed the last house down the road and broke into the trees. Yuri instinctively grew more alert and tightened his grip on his sword sheathe, ready for attack.

“You can relax,” Christabel said. “There will be no monsters on this side of the line. The Crukh protects us.”

“Yeah… forgive me for not having as much faith as you.” The Crukh hadn’t kept out whatever danger had lurked on their balcony last night. Besides, relaxing in wilderness just wasn’t something you could do after spending so many months camping out and travelling across back roads. It had taken weeks for Yuri to adjust back to living in a city and not jumping at every snapping twig. On most nights during their journey, basic barriers had kept the monsters at bay. Most nights. Yuri had woken to a frantic shoulder shake and the need to flip sleep to attack within two seconds to protect his friends from a particularly stubborn monster enough times to stay on his toes anytime he couldn’t see all the way to the horizon.

Yuri looked to Repede, whose tail calmly wagged as he sniffed at a tree root. He, at least, was relaxed, so Yuri let his tension ease down from level ten to about a seven.

“The line is just head.” Christabel pushed a branch aside, since they weren’t actually on a path, and revealed the rope stretching between the trees. “Be careful about going beyond it, because monsters might be out there.”

Estelle climbed on a boulder and grabbed the nearest paper dangling from a rope. She tugged it close so inspect the writing.

“That’s the guardian ward.” Christabel approached Estelle’s boulder. “The ropes are just to delineate the border.”

Estelle let go of the paper and put her hands on her hips as she surveyed the line of rope. “How does it work?”

“The writing on it is…. Holy words, basically. It’s a request to the Crukh to keep our home safe. We ask him to protect everything within the rope border. Beyond that, he doesn’t interfere with the wild monsters.”

Estelle turned to look down at the others. “Christabel, in your letter, you said your village had an alternative for blastia we might use. Is this what you meant?”

She nodded. “I don’t actually know if the Crukh could spread his power beyond the forest… but I thought, maybe, you could use these same barriers around your towns.”

Yuri and Estelle exchanged a look. As tactfully as he could, Yuri said, “I don’t think your Crukh will have power outside of this forest.” He doubted that a make-believe god had power inside the forest, either, but he didn’t say that.

“Oh….” She hung her head and fiddled with her green dress. “I’m sorry if you came all this way for nothing.”

“It’s ok!” Estelle hopped off the boulder and smiled at her. “We know you were trying to help. And maybe these wards work differently than you think. Maybe there’s some extra magic in the writing that the Crukh uses.” Her look at Yuri over Christabel’s shoulder said that maybe there was some real magic in the wards, and the villagers ignorantly attributed it to their god.

“Yeah,” Yuri said. “Don’t discount your offer yet.” He at least wanted to see a monster approach the barrier and see what happened. Yewbrooke had remained safe for generations, so obviously something was going on to protect the village. It wasn’t the easy guardian deity explanation Christabel believed, but he and Estelle weren’t ready to give up yet.

“We’re going to stay out here for a while,” Estelle said. “I want to explore the perimeter, if that’s ok.”

“Of course.” Christabel smiled at them. “Do you mind if I stay? If you discover anything new about the wards, I’d be interested to know, too.”

Yuri shrugged. “I’m not gonna kick you out. You’re the princess here, after all.”

“Ah, well, yes….” She looked to the ground and fiddled with her coin necklace.

Estelle began to walk along the perimeter, tracing a hand along the rope whenever it was low enough to the ground. Yuri and Christabel tailed a few steps behind.

“What’s the deal with the princess thing, anyway?” Yuri asked.

“Hm?” Christabel glanced up. “What do you mean?”

“You’re the princess. So, is there a queen? Or a king?”

Christabel shook her head. “No, prince or princess is the highest honour in Yewbrooke.” Estelle paused so they did as well, and Christabel idly picked at the bark on the tree beside them “We consider ourselves secondary in power to the Crukh, the true king of these woods. He watches over all the trees, all the animals, and us.”

“So… your mom and dad?”

Her hand fell still on the trunk. With her back to Yuri, she said softly, “They’re gone. My mother passed away when I was a small girl. My father….” She bit her lip and looked away.

Yuri was dying to ask about the story there, but was at least tactful enough not to pry. “Sorry to hear that. We’re all in the same boat, then.”

She let out a small gasp and looked over her shoulder. “Your parents are gone, too?”

Yuri leaned back a tad from the intensity of her shock. “Uh, yeah. Well, I don’t know about my dad, actually. No idea who he is. My mom died when I was a baby.”

“I’m so sorry for your loss.”

Yuri shrugged, pursed his lips, and focused on Estelle, who had moved on and was now inspecting the knots in a tree about twenty feet away. “Thanks, but…. I never met her, you know? Hard to miss something you never had.”

“If you don’t mind me asking, how did she die?”

“Got sick, or so they tell me.” Yuri risked a glance back at her and found her still staring at him. “It’s not that big a deal. Unless you’re a noble, diseases taking you down is fairly common. Heck, Estelle’s parents were royals but they kicked the bucket, too. That’s just the way of the world.”

Christabel turned around so her back pressed against the tree. “It isn’t here. For it to be common to die of disease… it sounds horrible. How can you bear it? To know that death could strike you down at any moment?”

Yuri shrugged. “I don’t really think about it.” Which was a lie, because he had trouble thinking of little else these days, but this was hardly his normal state of being. “Don’t you have disease out here?”

“No.” Christabel shook her head slowly. “That is, we have disease, but to actually die from it is so uncommon. The Crukh provides for us and protects us. Everyone in the village is so kind to me; it’s so rare to lose a parent, let alone both. So everyone sort of adopted me. I’ve never met another orphan before.”

“Yeah, well, come visit the lower quarter some time. You’d fit right in.”

Christabel shuddered. “Your stories of your hometown are frightening. I can’t imagine living someplace where food has to be so greedily rationed.”

Yuri couldn’t help a tiny bemused smile. Her ignorance of the world reminded him of Estelle back when they’d first met, but at least Estelle had had an entire library to broaden her horizons. “So if food isn’t bought or sold here, how is it distributed?”

“Well… everyone grows their own, mostly. Some people grow more carrots and some grow more potatoes, and then we swap with each other. There’s always plenty to go around. Those that don’t farm are given food to thank them for the hard work they do at other tasks, like cleaning in the great house, or running the tavern, or tailoring clothes.”

“You don’t have money at all, then?” This was as hard for Yuri to wrap his mind around as it was for Christabel to imagine a society with food scarcity. He looked again to the coin around her neck and supposed it wasn’t a coin after all, just an old disk of metal. It had engraving around the rim, but it must be in the alphabet she’d mentioned because he couldn’t make it out, although that could also be because of how worn it was. It seemed to be just a very old, worthless piece of metal on a leather strap, and generally an odd choice of jewellery.

“Sometimes travellers go to Zaphias to sell items. They use the gald to buy things before they leave, and bring those items back to us.”

Yuri looked away from her and back to the village. He could hear children laughing as they played in the distance. Yuri remembered being that age and how an undercurrent of stress had plagued him without notice for his entire childhood. What would it be like to grow up here in Yewbrooke, without ever fearing hunger or sickness? A glance ahead at Estelle reminded him that you didn’t have to go as far away as Yewbrooke to find children who grew up without those worries.

* * *

Estelle spent the morning and part of the afternoon traipsing around the village and inspecting the barrier ropes. Yuri meandered after her with Christabel, telling stories about faraway places until Estelle finally declared her research complete and returned to the village to start poring over all the notes she’d taken.

“She seems very… committed,” Christabel said as they walked behind Estelle toward the great house.

“That’s Estelle for you. When she decides she’s going to do something, she really goes all out.”

“I hope she finds something that helps you guys. And thanks for letting me spend the morning with you. It was so nice to hear about the outside.”

“Sure, whatever. Hey, is there a place where a guy can get a drink around here?” He really hoped this wasn’t some hyper religious commune that banned alcohol.

Christabel bobbed her head. “Oh, yes, we have a tavern.” They stopped in the central dirty square at the heart of the village. “The Magpie’s just over there. The best tavern in town! That is, the only tavern in town… but, I still think it’s good.”

“Hey, thanks, I’ll check it out. Estelle, do you want…” he turned around but Estelle had kept going when they stopped and already reached the great house. “Never mind then. Want to join me, Chris?”

“Oh, no, I - Chris?” She looked at him curiously.

“Got a problem with that?”

She smiled. “No. It’s… nice. But, anyway, I’m not old enough to drink. I think the village would be scandalized if their darling princess went in there. Thought, on that note, you really should, um… well, I mean, your shirt is….”

Yuri scowled and tugged at the open flaps of his shirt. “Is this a ‘modesty’ thing again?”

Pink crept onto her cheeks. “You can’t go in there with your, um, your chest…. It’s not, well, it’s indecent and people would be upset.”

Yuri rolled his eyes. “It’s hot.” He’d opened his shirt even more than he usually did to content with the heat. Sweat trickled on the back of his neck and the cool breeze on his chest kept him from going wild.

“Be that as it may….”

Yuri hated that phrase. His superiors had trotted it out sometimes when he was still in the Knights, generally to shut down any argument he had about why they were doing pointless shit just because it was ‘regulation.’ Flynn had even been known to use it. It basically meant, ‘you’re right, and I have no actual argument, but you have to do what I say anyway.’ But if that was the price he’d have to pay for a beer, so be it. He grumbled and buttoned up his shirt, immediately feeling trapped heat against his skin.

“Thank you, Anyway, for now I have some things to get ready for the festival, so you go on ahead.”

“Festival?”

“It’s nothing special. We have one once a month to honour the Crukh, and this month’s is in two nights. You and Estelle are of course invited to attend.”

He should have known it had something to do with this darn Crukh. “Sure, sounds interesting. See you around.”

Yuri said goodbye to Christabel and Repede and set off for the tavern. It was fairly empty since it was still early afternoon, but even if it had been packed, he was sure all eyes would have been on him. Christabel had said no outsiders had visited the village for as long as anyone could remember, so it was no surprise that he, Estelle, and Repede were the town’s biggest spectacles. He tried to ignore the inquisitive stares as he approached the bar.

“Hey. What can I get to drink here?”

The barman glanced to a group of men at the other end of the bar as if he needed a buddy system to deal with stranger danger. He cleared his throat and said, “Er… I have my own brew of beer, and there’s still some mead. My wife makes some nice non-alcoholic ginger ale, if you’d rather have that.”

Yuri slid onto a barstool. “I’ll have a pint of your beer, then. How much?”

The barmen wrinkled his already wrinkled brow. “You just said a pint, didn’t you?”

“What? Oh. I meant, how much does it… cost….” Yuri realized his mistake and said, “How can I compensate you for the drink?”

“Ah….” The man glanced to the other group of men again. An economic system based on perpetually paying it forward didn’t work when a stranger showed up.

The three men grabbed their drinks and moved over to sit next to Yuri. The trio all seemed to be around ten years older than Yuri, and the one who slapped Yuri’s back had large, callused hands.

“Don’t worry about it,” he said. “Cade here can spare a pint for our guest, aye?”

“I… suppose.” The barman delivered the drink and then left to avoid any further contact with the stranger.

“Thanks,” Yuri said, “but I’m not keen on charity.”

“It’s not charity.” He grinned at Yuri. “Now you have a drink and a reason to sit here and chat with us, right? Not every day a man gets to chat with someone from Zaphias.”

“Fair enough.”

The three men turned out to be called Abram, Morton, and Cranmer. Abram was the villager carpenter, Morton a farmer, and Cranmer, who had spoken first, was the blacksmith. None of the men had ever left the village before, and none of them intended to. Yuri found himself roped into another conversation about what Zaphias was like, how tall the buildings were, where the water came from, what a barrier blastia used to look like, and a thousand other questions. He was glad they’d gotten him a drink because his throat would have dried from all the explanations.

“Why don’t you guys just check out Zaphias yourself?” Yuri leaned on his elbow as he sat sideways at the bar. “Then you could see it and stop telling me I’m bullshitting about how tall the Sword Stair is.”

The trio glanced among themselves.

“It’s so far….”

“I have read about it in books and that’s almost the same thing….”

Cranmer shook his head. “I can’t leave the village, especially now. Nell’s almost popping and I couldn’t leave her with the baby so close to coming.”

His friends nodded and muttered agreement.

Yuri rolled his eyes. “What about you two, then?”

Morton and Abram fiddled their hands. Morton said, “Well… it’s dangerous, isn’t it? The outside world, I mean.”

“I… guess?” Yuri took a sip an shrugged. “The monsters outside the cities can be a pain, yeah.”

“Even in the cities, though.” Morton looked to his friends for back up. “There’s muggers, and plague, and famine, and drought, and corruption, and all that bad stuff.”

Yuri shook his head. “You guys worry too much. I’m still alive, aren’t I?” He felt like a hypocrite for saying it, though. He was still finding muscles that he’d tensed while in the woods and forcing them to relax.

“Yeah…” Abram said, “but I think I’d rather stay here. We’re comfortable and safe here. The Crukh provides everything we’d ever need. It’s just illogical to leave a utopia.”

The Crukh again. Yuri considered starting a drinking game of taking a sip every time someone in this village mentioned it, but he didn’t think his liver could survive the onslaught. “Just what is the Crukh? I know it’s the forest guardian or whatever, but what does it look like? Has anyone actually seen it?”

The three men exchanged glances, and Morton spoke first. “I always imagined him as some kind of enormous wolf, a real lord of the forest -majestic and sleek.”

“I think he can change shape,” Abram said. “It would make sense. Stories mention so many disjointed aspects of him; any monster that had all those qualities at once would be horrific.”

“I imagine someone human shaped, roughly,” said Cranmer with a thoughtful look on his face. “Human, but not. Taller, wizened, like an ancient grandfather. But only human shaped at a first glance, before you look closer.” His laughter was more stilted than normal. “At least that’s what I came up with as a little kid lying awake at night.”

Yuri listened to their tales of imagination with exasperation. “So what you’re telling me is that no one has any actual clue.”

Abram sniffed and turned his nose up. “The Crukh is an ancient and powerful deity. I can’t imagine why he would choose to become manifest before us mere mortals.”

“I wouldn’t want him to.” Morton shuddered and held his drink closer. “Anything that powerful would be terrifying to behold. He carved the river by dragging a claw through the earth, and made the mountains by pushing dirt out of the way so he could rest.”

“He did, did he?” Yuri tried to keep his voice from picking up the tone he used when little kids in the lower quarter told him fantastical stories.

“Be skeptical if you want.” Cranmer shook his head and looked at his glass. “If you lived here long enough, you’d understand.”

“Maybe.” Yuri believed it; you could believe anything if you grew up being told it was true.

After a few more minutes of idle chatter, Yuri thanked the men for the drink and the company and left. It was still mid-afternoon, so he decided to take a walk around the village. So far he’d only seen the main plaza and the barrier through the woods. The village was made up of two main roads that crossed in a sloppy X, with the great house and the Magpie located at the intersection. The other branches trailed off toward the trees with cottages and small fields on either side of the road. Yuri chose the branch that led north of the great house and took off.

As he passed the large building, Repede rose from the patch of shade below the balcony and trotted over to silently fall into step beside him.

“What do you think, Repede? Have you sensed any all-powerful forest spirits hanging in the air?” He thought of the way Repede had reacted at the balcony last night, tense and refusing to get close. Yuri wasn’t sure if he was ready to believe in giant monster that carved rivers, but there was certainly something in the atmosphere that unsettled him.

Along the way, he passed families working in the small fields surrounding every cottage. Most of them stopped to stare, some more obvious than others. Yuri nodded in greeting, and a few of them waved back. Dogs lounged in shady spaces by the house and he spotted a couple of cats napping on windowsills. Every field he passed was brimming with crops. The growing cabbages would put bowling balls to shame and he’d never seen vines with so many tomatoes in such bold red. Perhaps there was something in the soil out here, something that fertilized plants and warded off insects and birds.

Even when he was in the middle of town, Yuri could see the forest no matter where he looked. In one direction, a grove of trees had taken root between the river and the road, and in the other, the wall of forest formed the edge of the village. Yuri wished he knew enough about trees to pick out the type, but he was a city boy to the bone. As far as he knew, mahogany was a type of table and the proper name for the trees surrounding the village was ‘tall and mostly straight ones’. It didn’t matter that much, though, because Yuri wasn’t actually interested in the trees. His interest was drawn to the space between the trees, where shadows lurked and his eyes kept going back, expecting to see something.

It didn’t take too long for Yuri to reach the end of the road. The last house was a little wooden cottage with a thatch roof and smoke piping out of its stone chimney. Herbs hung to dry from the windowsill and Yuri breathed in the sweet aroma of a baking apple pie. Yuri half expected a bluebird to appear and sing songs to the fair maiden no doubt living inside.

The front door opened, but it was not a young woman singing to dormice who emerged. Mayor Gower said farewell to the very-pregnant woman in the doorway, and then turned to see Yuri and Repede. “Oh. Hello, Mr. Lowell. Do you need something?”

He shook his head. “Nah, I was just taking a walk. We were about to turn around.” They did so to begin the trip back toward the great house.

Gower fell into step beside him. He was a short man, but made up for it by standing as straight-backed as possible. He was almost on his tip-toes to seem taller. “How was your morning? Has the village treated you well?”

“Sure. The ones that are willing to talk to me have all been great.”

“Hm….” After a long pause, Gower said, “You must understand that we don’t get visitors to Yewbrooke.”

“So I’ve gathered.” Not ‘don’t get villagers often’, Yuri noticed, but ‘don’t get visitors, period.’

“I mean you no disrespect, but it would probably be best for you and your companion to return to Zaphias as soon as possible.”

“In other words, no disrespect, but get out of town?”

Gower’s face stiffened. “We are an isolated community. We have our own ways and aren’t used to outsiders. You want to learn how to defend against monsters, but the only secret to our safety is the Crukh and he doesn’t leave the forest. There is nothing for you here. It would be best for everyone if you returned to the city and we left each other alone.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

“Have a good day, Mr. Lowell.” Gower gave him a curt nod and then left the main road to make his way to another house.

Yuri rolled his eyes at the back of his head. Good riddance. “Why do you think he wants us to leave?” he asked Repede as they continued back to the great house. “Hiding something, you think?”

Repede whined in agreement.

Yuri wondered what that thing might be until they reached the back of the great house. He looked up at the balcony attached to his and Estelle’s room and, through the panes in the door, spotted Estelle resting her chin on her hands at a desk. He smiled a little at that, and then his eyes drifted across the building to the window set into the wall a few rooms down from theirs, where he saw something he didn’t expect.

Yuri’s smile faded into a frown. “There is definitely something up in this village.”


	4. Rules

When Estelle woke up the next morning, she saw Yuri’s bare back lounging on the bed across from her, his head propped up on his hand. He seemed to be staring out the balcony door. Repede had crawled onto Yuri’s bed at some point in the night and curled up, fast asleep, near Yuri’s legs. Estelle couldn’t remember ever seeing Repede climb into while they were travelling before. Yuri had once said he was too proud to sleep in a human bed, but something must have convinced Repede to put his pride aside and sleep closer to Yuri.

She cleared her throat and groggily whispered, “Yuri?” When he didn’t respond, she raised her voice to try again. “Yuri, are you awake?”

He jolted, waking Repede up and twisted onto his back to face her. “What’s wrong?”

The flash of panic in his eyes dragged her fully out of sleep and she sat up. “Nothing’s wrong… with me, anyway. Are you ok?”

Yuri let out a long breath and rubbed his eyes. “Me? Yeah. ‘Course. Sorry, you startled me. I was just… thinking.”

“You… were staring at the forest pretty intently.” She tried not to sound judgemental.

Yuri grabbed his discarded shirt from the floor and slipped it on as he set up. The room was so warm, Estelle didn’t blame him for sleeping with it off. She also didn’t blame him for not wanting to crack the balcony door open to get a breeze.

“Couldn’t sleep. I was just zoning out hoping sleep would come eventually.”

“How long were you awake? Did you sleep at all last night?”

“Enough.” His red eyes said otherwise.

“Yuri… did you see something last night?” If he had, he wouldn’t have woken her up.

“Don’t worry about it.”

Estelle put the pieces together. Something had spooked Yuri in the night, possibly the same something that had startled her the night before. Yuri had probably then taken it upon himself to remain vigilant for the rest of the night, just in case. He must have been awake for hours already. “Ok. Are you hungry at all?”

“Not really.”

“I’m going down to eat breakfast and then go for a walk. You stay here and get some sleep.”

Yuri pushed himself partially up on his elbows. “No, it’s fine, I’ll go with you.”

“Yuri, I’ll be fine. I’m just going for a walk around the village. You need to sleep.” She wondered if Yuri thought he was subtle about how poorly he’d been sleeping. Even just in the past few nights of them travelling together, whenever he fell asleep before her, she always noted how restless his sleep was. She was sure he was having nightmares, no matter how often he joked about dreaming of giant lasagnas the next morning. Then there was the way he had reacted when they first reached the woods, too. That hadn’t been normal nerves. Estelle was used to what Yuri was like when he was on guard and expecting trouble, and though he could be a bit flinchy, he’d never started panicking like that. Yuri wasn’t ok this morning and Estelle suspected he hadn’t been ok for a while now.

“Ok, but-”

Estelle grabbed his shoulders and pushed him back to his pillow. “You sleep. I’m going for a walk. Repede, make sure he gets some rest, ok?”

It was a testament to how much Yuri clearly needed the sleep that Repede barked in agreement and sided with her against Yuri.

“Traitor,” Yuri grumbled and relaxed into the mattress.

Estelle changed into a light summery dress while Yuri’s back was turned and then went for the door. Yuri probably didn’t think she’d heard him say, “Stay awake for me, will you, Repede?” as she close the door.

Estelle sighed heavily and wished she knew what to do for Yuri. It would help if he would actually open up about what was bothering him, but then he wouldn’t be Yuri, would he?

She joined the house staff eating breakfast in the dining room. Christabel popped her head in to wish everyone a good morning halfway through, and then ran off with a piece of toast. Messala, a housekeeper with a sun-tanned face, laugh lines around her eyes, and curly brown hair, smiled after she left.

“Ah, that girl is so diligent. Such a peach.”

“Is she still getting ready for the… festival?” Estelle asked. “What does that entail?”

“She’s probably rehearsing,” another woman, Thaisa, said. Thaisa had her mousy hair pulled back in a tight bun. “She always performs on her fiddle at our festivals. This will be the last one, so I’m sure she wants to make it memorable.”

Messala let out a long, sad sigh. “Oh, I’ll miss her playing. She’s a wonder with that fiddle. I used to hear her practicing down by the river when she was a wee thing.”

“Why is this the last performance?” Estelle asked.

Messala startled and glanced to Thaisa. “Well, she - I mean….”

Thaisa interrupted and said bluntly, “She won’t be princess anymore after the solstice, so she will not perform at the monthly festivals.”

Estelle startled. “She wont? Why? What’s going to happen to her?”

“We will pick a new prince or princess at the summer festival,” Thaisa explained.

Messala went on, “That’s right. They will serve for a year, and then we make the selection again. Christabel was only selected as princess last summer. So we have only enjoyed her performances at the festivals for this past year, you see.”

“Oh… I understand.” Estelle’s sudden distress took a few moments to fade. She felt silly for assuming the worst. She should have known the situation in Yewbrooke was like this. Had she not read about ancient societies who had ceremonial kings who served for limited time spans? The fact that the town had a princess and a mayor should have told her who really ran the place, and that Christabel’s role was more ceremonial than anything else. That gave Estelle another stab of empathy for the princess who was mostly just a figurehead, and she felt a little more justified in fearing that such a princess would be manipulated and cast aside when she no longer had use.

The other women were looking at her curiously and Estelle wished she had Yuri’s ability to keep her emotions masked. To move the conversation along, she said, “Christabel hasn’t always lived in the great house, then, has she?”

“Not always,” Messala said, “but her case is different. Her mother died when she was about eight years old, so she was brought to this house to live. Her old bedroom was further down the hall from yours, but she moved into her current one when she was chosen as princess last summer.”

Estelle had been seven when her mother died. She wished she’d had an entire community to embrace her and become her new family. She may agree with Yuri that there was something very off about this town, but it at least sounded nicer than having the Council appointed as her guardian and being parented by committee. “I suppose her father died at around the same time, then?”

Messala and Thaisia froze for a full second, like actors in a play who had abruptly forgotten their lines. Then, they seemed to remember their lines again and conversation continued, except that Messala skipped right over Estelle’s questions and said, “Christabel’s old house is down on the south side of the village, not far from Gideon’s place.”

“Gideon? Who’s that?”

Thaisa rolled her eyes. “Honestly, Messy, you don’t have the give the girl a history lecture.” To Estelle, she said, “Gideon is the charcoal burner.”

“He’s a nasty one,” Messala said. “You say hello and he just glowers like you cursed his bloodline. Only person I’ve ever seen him be nice to is Christabel, probably because they used to be neighbours, plus he shares her -”

“Messy,” Thaisa scolded. “You have no business gossipping about our neighbours like this.”

Messala pressed her lips together for a second. “Sorry, Thaisa.”

After that, no matter what questions Estelle asked, both woman dodged around them and refused to go any deeper into town gossip.

Estelle left the great house after cleaning her plate. She planned to spend the day in the library, but it would probably be hot and gross outside by midday, so she’d go for a walk this morning and retreat inside in the afternoon. Outside, birds chirped and insects buzzed. She strolled past villagers working in their gardens and cats dozing in warm patches of grass. Curiosity took her town the road to the south of the great house, along the river. She smiled and bade good morning to a couple of men repairing a fence around a rappig pen and waved to a child weaving a flower necklace out of dandelions. The water along this part of the river wasn’t very deep, maybe only knee-deep at most. It babbled over rocks that stuck up from the water.

Halfway down the path, she came across a little cottage with weeds filling its front garden and knew it must be Christabel’s. The windows were filled with dust and cobwebs and a bird had built its nest in the mossy crook of the roof and chimney. Estelle paused at the edge of the road where a few flat stones leading to the door said there used to be path, but it was fully overgrown now.

It was odd to see an abandoned house. She would have thought that in a small village, any empty house would be given to whatever young couple was ready to establish their homestead. Estelle lifted the hem of her dress up to avoid the most tangled weeds and stepped from paver to overgrown paver, hopping to the slab of stone at the front door. She stepped to the front window and cupped her hands against the glass to see inside.

It seemed to be a typical small house. She could make out a table and some chairs, a pantry, a hearth, and a door leading to another room. In the middle of the room, over the table, some sort of fabric strip hung from the ceiling. Estelle pressed her face closer to make out more details, but all she could tell was that it was about a foot long, a few inches wide, and was tied to something embedded in a ceiling beam. She squinted to try to make out the pattern on the fabric, but it was too dark inside to see.

Shouts and an excited oink distracted her. She turned to see that the fence repair job had gone poorly, the rappig had gotten out, and was now careening down the road in a bid for freedom.

“Stop him! Catch him!” a running man yelled.

He wasn’t yelling to Estelle, she realized, but to another man further down the path. This one carried a large cloth bag on his back that was filled with small logs and branches. He stepped in the middle of the road at the sight of the rampaging rappig, and Estelle leapt through the weeds to reach the road again. She hated the idea of the man getting knocked over when he already carried such a heavy burden.

She reached the road just as the rappig passed the abandoned house. Her suddenly arrival and arms swinging for it caused the creature to squeal and veer toward the river. “No, wait, come back!” Estelle dashed after the animal.

“Stop! Wait, stop!” The men were shouting still, but the rappig didn’t listen. Estelle wasn’t sure what her plan was, but if she jumped and tackled it, she could probably hold it still just long enough for the owners to arrive and coax it back to its pen.

The rappig charged right into the river, spraying Estelle as she followed close behind. One foot splashed in, and then someone grabbed her wrist and yanked her back.

“I can get it!”

“Hold on there, little lady.” The man with the pack full of wood pulled her back to the the road.

The two men who had been chasing the rappig stopped at side of the road and panted. One rested his hands on his hips and shook his head. “So much for that.”

“You can still get it.” Estelle’s head shot between the men and the rappig. It slowed down once it reached the other bank, seeming to realize it was no longer being chased. It was now snuffling about in the bushes by the river. “If we move slowly, we could sneak up on it and -”

“Aye, but we’d have to cross the river to do that, no? Can’t do that.”

“Sure you can.” The man had let go of her wrist now that she wasn’t an imminent flight risk. “It’s not that deep.”

The man with the sack said, “We don’t cross the river. One of the rules. Simple as that.”

“Yep,” one of the rappig men said. “It crossed the river. It’s the Crukh’s property now. Ah, well, that one was rather small anyway.” He nodded to the man with Estelle. “Morning, by the way, Gideon.”

Estelle quickly turned to look at the now-identified Gideon as he grunted in the way of ‘good morning.’ When the other men left, Estelle said, “You’re Gideon? I heard about you! Oh, that sounds bad, sorry, I just meant that Messal and Thaisa had mentioned you and I don’t know anyone else in town, so….”

“Uh-huh.” He hefted his sack and began walking again. He was a charcoal burner, Messala had said, so the wood must be intended for his kiln to become charcoal.

Estelle hurried to follow him. “You used to be Christabel’s neighbour, right?”

“You got a reason for asking?”

“I’m just curious. Messala said you had something in common with her.”

“Messala doesn’t know how to keep people’s business to herself.” He veered off the road to a dirt path leading to a cottage closer to the woods. Smoke drifted out of the tip of a conical kiln in the front garden. “There a reason you’re following me?”

“I’m just curious about this village, and I was hoping you would-”

“I won’t.” He turned to face her, and Estelle automatically took a step back. Gideon inspected her for a few seconds and then said, “Take it from me, kid. You and your boyfriend ought to pack up and leave town. This ain’t a place for city folk. Now stop following me.” He turned and stalked away.

Estelle stood at the junction of the path, too shocked by his bluntness to respond right away. All she got out was a half-hearted, “…He’s not my boyfriend.”

Estelle glanced back at Christabel’s house and then decided it was time to go back to the great house and check out the library.

* * *

When Yuri woke up, he was hot. This turned out to be because Repede was lying beside him, pressed against his body, and both of them lay in a patch of sun that streamed through the balcony door. Repede was asleep, but woke up when Yuri crawled out of bed.

“Sorry. Didn’t mean to wake you.”

Repede grunted and hopped off the bed.

Yuri wondered about that. Repede hadn’t slept in bed with him since he was a puppy. The dog seemed to think soft human furniture was beneath him and a proper canine would only sleep on the floor. But, Repede was obviously spooked by Yewbrooke. He may have wanted that closeness with Yuri for the sake of comfort like when he was young, but then again, he may have thought that Yuri needed that comfort. Yuri hated the fact that Repede was right.

He’d slept all morning, but still felt exhausted. Yuri stepped out to the balcony and slowly closed the door behind him. There was nothing out here. No matter how often he’d stared through the glass last night, there never had been. He couldn’t explain what had woken him up in the middle of the night, or why he immediately felt like he was being watched the moment he closed his eyes or turned his back to the door. He was probably just edgy in general, which was why he hadn’t been able to fall asleep again last night until Estelle got up.

“Breakfast time,” he announced to nobody and the amended, “Well… more like lunch time.”

Downstairs, he found Estelle in the library. She sat at a table by an open window with books spread around her and a paper covered in notes. The only writing implement she had available was a stick of charcoal, which was probably responsible for the black smudge on her nose.

“Hi, Yuri! Did you sleep ok?”

“Just fine.” Yuri slid into another chair at the table. “Sorry for conking out all morning. What have you been up to?”

“I took a walk like I said I would. Oh, something kind of strange happened when I was down near Christabel’s old house.”

“Oh yeah?” Yuri folded his arms. “Strange how?”

“A rappig escaped, and it ran across the river, but nobody would cross the river to try to catch it. They forced me to stay back, too. They just said that crossing the river is against the rules, because it’s the Crukh’s territory.”

Yuri rolled his eyes. “I’m getting pretty sick of hearing that name. It’s crazy that they’d let a livestock animal go so easily, though.”

“There’s something else weird, too.” Estelle frowned and apparently struggled to find a way to explain. “I asked about Christabel’s parents this morning. The two ladies who work here - Messala and Thaisa - told me about her mother, but when I asked about her father, they froze up. It was like they had no idea how to react to the question, and then they just moved on as if I hadn’t said anything. It was so weird.”

“Huh. Chris was pretty hesitant to say anything about him yesterday, too.”

“I wonder what happened to him. What if it was something so horrible no one is willing to talk about it?”

“I’ll just ask her.”

“What? No! Yuri, you can’t just ask her directly like that. It would be rude.”

“Ok, ok, fine. I’ll… try to be subtle.”

Estelle gave him a reproachful look.

“I can be subtle!” But he couldn’t be annoyed at Estelle’s doubtful expression.

“Maybe I’ll talk to her.”

“If you insist. What are you doing here, though? You can’t read these books, can you?” Yuri twisted an open book to look at it head on, but that didn’t help. It was scribed by hand in an alphabet he’d never seen before, and Yuri had enough trouble reading more elaborate handwriting styles in his own language.

“Not yet, but I’m working on it!” She pushed her paper toward him to demonstrate. She had a page covered in letters, tables, and symbols. “I’m trying to crack the cipher. Letters that appear alone are probably ‘I’ or ‘A’, recurring chunks of three letters are probably ‘the’, things like that. The language underneath is the same, it’s just written differently, which makes it a lot easier than translating.”

“Made any breakthroughs yet?” Sometimes Estelle really impressed Yuri. He wouldn’t have had a clue where to start with this task, and he doubted he would have even thought to research in the library in the first place.

“Not really. I did notice that the writing on the papers around the barriers is in the same alphabet. So, once I figure this out, I’ll be able to read what the wards say.”

“Those papers are probably worthless, you know. If scraps of paper could ward off monsters, we wouldn’t have been in such a mess with blastia to begin with.”

“I know, I’m just curious. And besides, maybe they really do have some form of magic that the rest of the world isn’t aware of.”

“Could be.” Yuri doubted it, but then, maybe he was just uncomfortable with the idea that there had been an alternative to blastia all along. “Have you had lunch yet? I was going to go make myself a sandwich.”

“No. I want to finish this, first.”

Yuri didn’t see how his presence could help her literary research, so he stood and said, “I’ll make a sandwich for you and you can eat in here, alright?”

“Oh! Thank you!”

“Don’t work yourself too hard,” Yuri said on his way out.

* * *

Yuri left Estelle in the library for the afternoon and went out into the village with Repede. He wasn’t sure what to do with himself. He’d come here to learn about a way to protect people, but now it was all research based and he wasn’t sure how to help with that. It worsened the tension that was constantly in his muscles these days. He didn’t like being in Yewbrooke, but there was something important to be done here even though he himself couldn’t do it. He felt useless doing nothing, but he couldn’t think of anything he could do to help Estelle, so instead he just stressed.

Yuri ended up near the edge of the village, not far from where the road to the rest of the world met Yewbrooke. He and Repede rounded the corner of a cottage and saw a boy about six or seven years old carefully walking across the top beam of a fence around the cottage’s garden. His arms stuck out to the side, swaying back and forth as he wobbled. As soon as he spotted Yuri and Repede, he yelped, lost his balance, and toppled onto the grass.

“Whoa, careful.” Yuri hurried forward and dropped to his knee in front of the kid. “You alright?”

The boy clutched his knee and gritted his teeth. He glanced nervously at Repede and said, “N-no, I’m fine!”

“This is Repede. Don’t be scared; he’s friendly. He just wants to see if you’re ok.”

Repede sat and thumped his tail on the ground.

“I’m not scared!” the boy insisted. “You’re not scary at all.”

“We’re not, huh? I guess there’s scarier things around here than a guy and a big dog.” Yuri thought of the monstrous descriptions of the Crukh the men at The Magpie had supplied and suddenly wished he hadn’t crouched with his back to the woods. If Repede wasn’t beside him, with keen ears that would alert him if anything was coming, he would have gotten up and turned around immediately.

“Uh-huh. The charcoal man is really scary.”

That… hadn’t been what Yuri was expecting. In a village with an allegedly omnipotent forest god and an unknown entity that lurked in the night (though maybe that one was just in his head), he hadn’t expected a kid to declare a grumpy old man the scary thing. “He’s that bad, is he?”

“One time my brother dared me to peek into his house, and he came out and yelled at me for standing in his flowerbed. Everyone knows he’s mean and he’ll probably throw you into the woods beyond the barrier if you mess up his flowers.”

“Huh.” Estelle’s description of him hadn’t suggested ‘avid gardener,’ but there were probably not many hobbies to choose from out here. “Any idea why he’s so cranky? Does he have a family or anything?”

“No.” The boy shook his head. “He’s just mean.”

Yuri had to wonder how mean Gideon could be, because he remembered similar cranky old men in the lower quarter as a kid. Then he grew up and realized that he’d be cranky too if a couple of eight-year-olds knocked on his door as a dare and then ran away giggling. “Some people are just like that. How’s your knee?”

“It’s ok.” He pulled his hand away and showed a scuff of dirt and grass.

“Uh-oh, this looks bad.” Yuri gently rubbed his thumb on the edge of the grass stain.

“W-what?”

“It’s already bruised green - that’s a bad sign. I dunno if we’ll be able to keep the leg.” Yuri shook his head sadly.

“Really…?” The kid started looking scared again.

Yuri rubbed a little harder and smudged away some of the grass. “Oh, my mistake, it’s just a grass strain. You’re good.” He patted the kid’s shoulder and then helped him to his feet.

The front door of the cottage slammed open and an woman shouted, “What are you doing to my son!?”

Yuri held up his hands and took a step back. “He just fell off the fence.”

The woman huffed across the garden and grabbed her son’s arm to pull him close to her. “Stay away from him. You - you shouldn’t even be here!”

Yuri folded his arms. “Seems like a lot of people have been saying that. Sorry if you feel like we’re intruding, but we were invited.”

The woman sniffed and made a sour face. “Christabel should never have invited you. I don’t know what she expected you to learn here and inviting outsiders here is against our ways. That whole family has no respect for our laws, and if you have any as well, you’d go back to Zaphias where you belong.”

“Thanks for the warm welcome. I love how inviting everyone in this village is. C’mon, Repede, let’s see if Estelle’s ready for a break.”

Yuri followed the road back toward the great house. At least he had one thing in common with this creepy village: neither of them wanted him to be here.

When he returned to the house, he poked his head in the library and saw Estelle still dutifully hunched over the table. Leaving her be, he went up stairs and knocked on Christabel’s door.

She slid into the hallway and shut it behind her as she said, “Oh, hi, Yuri. Can I help you with something?”

“Yeah. I just have a a question. Why did you invite us here?”

She tilted her head and fiddled with her necklace. “What do you mean? I explained in the letter, didn’t I? I wanted to help you.”

“Right. But the only method of staying safe you have is the Crukh, and he won’t leave the forest. And according to a rather angry lady I met, inviting outsiders here is against the rules anyway. So what gives?”

“I just thought that the Crukh might not be the only powerful god in the world. Maybe there’s something else where your city is that could work. As for breaking the rules, well….” She folded her hands behind her back and smiled. “From what you and Estelle have said about your journey, you don’t seem the sort to care that much about rules anyway.”

Yuri shrugged a little; she wasn’t wrong. “Maybe I don’t, but shouldn’t the princess?”

“Are you going to turn me in to the Knights?” she asked with a little smile.

“Ha, ok, honour among thieves, then? What are all the rules, anyway? I feel like we keep tripping over new ones.”

“Oh, yes, I’m sorry, I should have explained to you when you first arrived. Obviously things like stealing and assault are just as illegal here as they are where you live, but we have a few special rules.” She leaned against her door and held out her hand to count off on her fingers. “The ones you should know about are that you mustn’t go out after dark, you mustn’t cross the river, and you must sacrifice a piece of every meal to the Crukh to thank him for his bounty.”

“And the ones I don’t need to know about?”

She waved her hand. “Community lifestyle things; they don’t affect outsiders.”

“Ok…. But the ones you mentioned are important? What if we break them?”

“If you break the rules, you will be punished.”

“There a jail cell in this house somewhere?’ Yuri looked over his shoulder like it would magically appear.

“No, these rules are enforced by the Crukh. If you break them, he will take care of your punishment.”

“Huh… at lunch today, I made sandwiches for Estelle and I. Neither of us sacrificed a piece of it. Are we going to be punished then?”

Christabel looked startled and then nervous. “Um… oh dear. Well, it’s probably ok, because you’re outsiders. I’m sure the Crukh understands you didn’t know. You shouldn’t do it again, though.”

“I’ll keep that in mind. One more thing - what happened to your dad?”

Christabel froze up and Repede whined and gave Yuri a look. Ok, so maybe that hadn’t been as subtle as Estelle would have wanted. “Sorry. You don’t have to talk about him if you don’t want.”

“I - he….” Her eyes darted around the hall like she was afraid someone would overhear. “I’m sorry, I have to go. I’ll see you at dinner, ok?”

“What? Uh, yeah, ok.” Christabel was already hurrying down the stairs as he finished talking. When the front door slammed shut, Yuri looked down at Repede.

“What do you think? Weird, huh?”

Repede woofed.

“Yeah. Really weird.”


	5. The Festival

Yuri awoke sharply. It had been such a little noise that woke him up, but the click of the balcony door had seemed like a clang of iron when it cut through his sleep. He sat up in bed and ran a hand through his sweaty hair. He had just heard the balcony door shut - something had entered the room.

Yuri was on his feet and holding his sword before that thought had time to finish processing. He stood in the space between the two beds, sword ready, determined to put himself between Estelle and whatever was in the room.

Except nothing was there. Repede was asleep on the floor and the only sound was Estelle’s soft breathing. Yuri stared into the darkness, willing something to move. He had heard the door shut, he knew it. Something was going to burst out of the shadows at any second and tear Estelle to shreds. He was so tense his muscles ached.

The room was dark and furniture blocked his movement. He couldn’t protect Estelle like this and she was going to die. When she fell into his arms at the Sword Stair, he’d decided then and there that he would never let anything happen to Estelle again. Believing she was going to die there had twisted his heart so badly it still bore the scares and he could not bear for that to happen again. Right now, though, he didn’t know if he could. She was going to die and he couldn’t save her and the familiar panic started bubbling below the surface again. Dread came so clear that he felt it ache in his torso, filling him up and making it hard to expand his lungs enough to breathe.

“Yuri?”

The soft voice made him jump and he whirled around to see Estelle sitting up in bed.

“What are you doing?” she asked, rubbing her eyes.

“Sorry.” It came out like a wheeze from his strangled throat. He forced a few deep breaths and shoved the panic down, letting it vibrate in the background. His voice marginally clearer, he said, “Didn’t mean to wake you.”

“What’s happening? Why is your sword out?”

Yuri lowered it. He was beginning to accept that there was nothing in the room and they were not in imminent danger. If anything was here and meant them harm, it would have sprung when she spoke and startled him out of his vigilance. “I had a weird dream and got spooked. Don’t worry about it.”

“Ok….” She didn’t look like she believed him. “Do you feel ok?”

He hated the concern in her voice. Yuri liked looking after other people; having others look after him made him feel childish. “Yeah, I’m fine.”

“Was there something outside? Like the first night?”

Yuri shrugged. “I didn’t see anything.” It was the truth enough. He didn’t want to scare her. “I’m sorry for waking you. It was just a dream that got me rattled.”

Repede had awoken and was watching him from the foot of the bed. That made Yuri relax even more, and he felt stupid for not noticing Repede’s lack of response earlier. If something had been in the room, Repede would have noticed it before Yuri had. He must have imagined it; maybe it really was just a dream.

“Oh… ok. Do you want to talk about it?”

“Nah. I’m going back to bed.” He put his sword down, close enough to the mattress to be within reach, and slid under the sheet even though it was too warm. He pulled it close to his chin like a cocoon just to put that one extra layer between himself and the darkness outside. Yuri turned his back to the balcony and concentrated on falling asleep again, which was difficult with anxiety still rushing through his veins. Nervous energy vibrated in his heart and every time he closed his eyes he felt like something was going to lunge at him.

Another thought occurred to him. There was nothing in the room now, but couldn’t that have been the sound of something leaving? That thought didn’t help Yuri relax. He had to wonder, if something had crept into the room, so silently that even Repede didn’t awaken, what had it been doing? Yuri didn’t get much sleep for the rest of the night.

* * *

Yewbrooke really was a quiet, cheerful town. While eating a picnic lunch on the hill leading down to the river, Yuri barely remembered what had happened the night before. At the bottom of the hill was the river, which gave their picnic a gentle burbling in the background. Behind them, voices from the village suggested a relaxing late spring day full of children playing and pies cooling in windowsills. The sun blazing down made Yuri regret wearing so much black; at least Estelle had been smart enough to pack a yellow sundress.

She sat apart from Yuri and Christabel, surrounded by a gaggle of children. Her voice drifted on the warm breeze, “…and then Flynn rode in, waving a letter in his hand, right between the two armies!” The children ooo-ed and ahhh-ed at appropriate places as Estelle told her (slightly watered down for the age bracket) account of their adventure. As she sat on the grass and told stories to enraptured children, Yuri realized he hadn’t seen her this relaxed since before Midbell.

Yuri and Christabel sat off to the side, legs stretched out on the hill with a view of the river below. Repede sprawled on the grass near Yuri, arms and legs stretched out and fast asleep. It had been a nice picnic with sandwiches brought from the great house. Christabel had dutifully thrown a corner of one of her sandwiches into the river as an offering, and Yuri had wondered if the suggestion of an intruder in their room last night was linked to their failure to sacrifice at lunch, before discarding that thought as irrational.

“It’s always dangerous to leave the village,” Christabel was saying. “Gideon’s father was killed by an eggbear about fifteen years ago while collecting wood to burn.”

“Damn. So much for the Crukh’s protection, huh?”

Christabel gave him a stern look. “The Crukh only protects us within the bounds of the village. Haven’t I told you that? He’s the guardian of the entire forest; he can’t prevent other animals from hunting.”

Yuri, who had long ago gotten fed up with Flynn explaining that he ‘couldn’t’ do things rather than simply wouldn’t, rolled his eyes. “I bet he could protect you beyond the rope lines if he wanted to. He just doesn’t want to.”

“Well… perhaps, but the reason he doesn’t want to is because it isn’t fair for the forest. He has to balance the needs of the village with the needs of the forest as a whole.”

“There it is. He can protect you throughout the forest, but chooses not to because he thinks other factors are more important.”

“They are important!” Christabel, who had been lying on her stomach, pushed herself up on her folded arms. “Humans and animals live in a delicate balance.”

“I never said it wasn’t a good reason.” Yuri grabbed a cracker from the basket and absently munched on it before continuing. “There’s a big difference between can and will. Just because someone can help you, doesn’t mean they will, and just because they aren’t helping you, doesn’t mean they can’t.”

Christabel thought about this and slowly lowered herself back to the grass, where she rested her chin on her folded arms.

Yuri felt bad for interrupting her story about the charcoal seller. He blamed his stress; with part of his mind occupied with fretting over that important thing he needed to take care of, he had less thought to spare on holding his tongue. The fact that a moment to stop and search through his memory revealed he had no ‘thing’ to be stressing over didn’t make him feel any better. Surely there was something he had to worry about - some shadow of a daunting task looming over him - but the only task he could think of was helping Estelle learn about Yewbrooke’s defences. It was probably the weird feeling that had come over him last night and made him feel like there was something bigger looming out in the woods to deal with.

“So, what about this Gideon?” Yuri asked. “Does he still gather wood for charcoal after what happened to his old man?”

“Yes.” Christabel seemed relieved to return to this topic. “He got badly hurt a few years ago, though, and almost retired. It’s why he walks with a limp now. But I figured that monsters are repelled by strong odours, so I made him a little tin box to hold a handful of mint leaves. He carries it on his belt now and it wards off most monsters.”

Yuri gave her a look. “That’s pretty clever. We have something like that called a basic barrier; I never thought of making one myself.”

She looked away and fiddled with her hair. “Ah… it was only fiddling around. I just hope it protects him. He’s a nice man, if he lets you get to know him.”

“I guess it’s the princess’ job to protect your people.”

“Oh, I wasn’t princess yet when I made that.”

“Ah, right.” He remembered Estelle relating to him what she’d learned from the staff at the house. “Hey, how do you pick the prince or princess, anyway? Is it a vote?”

“No.” Christabel sat up and fiddled at her neck to pull out the coin on a string she wore. “We decide with this. It’s the token of the Crukh. We have a big feast on the first day of summer every year, and the coin is hidden inside a sweet bun. Everyone older than fifteen takes a bun, and whoever finds the coin in their bun has been chosen to be ruler for the next year.”

Yuri tried not to laugh at what was clearly a sacred tradition for her people. “A bread-ocracy, huh?”

“The Crukh chooses. At least….” She turned the coin over and over in her fingers. “That’s what everyone says.”

“You don’t sound so sure.”

She shrugged half-heartedly. “Sometimes I wonder if it’s really just chance. I occasionally find myself lying awake at night and wondering, what did I do to deserve being princess? Why me?”

“I think a lot of people feel like that. I’ve got this friend - Flynn, the guy you wrote - who said he feels the same way about being commandant. I’m sure you’re perfectly worthy.”

“Hm… I guess….” Christabel gathered up the remains of her lunch. “Thank you for eating with me. I need to go help prepare for the festival tonight. You are attending, right?”

“Wouldn’t miss it.”

After Christabel left, Yuri stretched out on the grass and listened to Estelle relate the story of Ghasfarost. She was a good storyteller. Even though Yuri had lived it, he found himself getting engaged with the tale and feeling excitement for his own daring deeds. She wanted to be a writer, he recalled. The idea of her settling into a simple life as a writer of children’s stories came naturally to him… except when it didn’t. Such a career would suit Estelle perfectly, but imagining either of them with such a mundane, domestic life seemed uncanny. To settle into such a peaceful life after all the adventures they’d been through just didn’t seem to fit.

Estelle finished her story with the defeat of Barbos (by the end of which, Yuri was starting to feel anxious again from reliving the stress of Ghasfarost). She sent the children off to play on their own and then crawled over the grass to sit with him in the sun.

“Nice story,” Yuri said. “I especially liked the part where the hero punched Barbos in the face.”

Estelle smiled a little. “It seemed in-character for him.”

“You skipped some of the dialogue, though.”

Her smile slipped into a pout. “If I had recounted your dialogue exactly, the story wouldn’t have been appropriate for children….”

Yuri laughed and wondered how many new words Estelle had added to her vocabulary since running off with him. Flynn would probably be happy to tell him.

“You know… maybe Yewbrooke isn’t so bad after all.” Estelle twisted to look over her shoulder at the village. “Their worship of this forest god is a little weird, but other than that, it just seems like a nice, isolated little village.”

“Hm… it does seem pretty tranquil.” Did Estelle not feel the pressing danger that lurked in the trees? Even today, he felt like turning his back to the woods across the river would invite an attack. “I don’t quite trust them, though.”

“Why?”

“Let me show you.” He hopped to his feet and took her hand to pull her up. They made their way up the hill and past the bakery, where the scent of freshly baked bread asked what Yuri could possibly find wrong with such a pleasant town. They went back to the great house, where Yuri asked, “Have you been around the back?”

“No, I haven’t gone down that path yet. Why?”

Yuri led the way around the big building. They crossed a grassy lawn behind the house and looked up at ivy-covered stone walls and old wooden shingles. “Check out the windows on the second floor.”

Estelle shielded her eyes against the sun and peered up. “Well, I see our balcony there by the tree, and the windows in the hall, and….” Estelle paused and stared; she’d seen it, too. “Are those bars on one of the windows?”

“Two of them, actually. The one next to it has bars, too. I think they’re the same room.”

Estelle lowered her arm and looked to Yuri with concern. “But why would there be bars on the window?”

“Beats me. I think that’s Christbel’s room, on the far side of the building opposite ours.”

“Yes, I think you’re right. It doesn’t make sense, though. She’s the princess; why would there be bars on her windows?”

Yuri shrugged. “Makes me wonder - are those bars to keep someone in, or to keep something out?”

* * *

That night, Yuri headed to the library to find Estelle. After their picnic, she had returned to her cave of books to resume trying to crack the code. Her table in the library had an ever-growing mess of books and paper and she didn’t even look up until he tapped her shoulder.

Estelle startled more than he’d expected and twisted around with a quill raised like a knife. “Oh! It’s just you.”

“Sorry for startling you.” He felt guilty. He would have reacted the same way if someone came up behind him while he was concentrating and he felt a pang of affinity for Estelle. At least they were together in how difficult it was to ‘turn off’ after adventuring.

“No, it’s fine, I just didn’t hear you come in.” She set the quill down. “Do you need something?”

“Well, the festival is going to start in a few minutes. You ready to go?”

Estelle glanced at her notes. “I actually made some big progress today. I was thinking, maybe I would skip the festival so I can get a little more work done.”

“Seriously? You need a break.”

“I had a long break at lunch today.”

Yuri put a hand on his hip. “That was almost eight hours ago. C’mon, you’ve been hunched over books so long, you’re going to throw out your back.”

“It’s fine. Look, I made progress.” She slid a paper across the table to him. “I found a copy of a book I recognize. I only know the title - Philosophies of Geraios Thinkers - but there’s a woodcut engraving in it that’s unmistakable, so I figured out what all those letters are. I’m getting close!”

“Cool. Sounds like you deserve a break.”

“I don’t,” she said immediately and then looked away, biting her lip.

Yuri’s mild amusement at her obsession slipped into a frown. “What do you mean you don’t deserve a break?”

She mumbled, “I just need to keep working,” and wouldn’t meet his eyes.

Yuri sighed and rubbed her shoulder. “You’re not going to fix the blastia problem by working yourself to death.”

“I know. But I just…. It’s my fault the Adephagos happened, so it’s my fault we got rid of the blastia, so I owe it to everyone who suffered because of me to work on a solution.”

“Estelle. The Adephagos was there was centuries. It would have come out sooner or later. Stop blaming yourself for it.”

“I - I know, but….”

Yuri wished Flynn were here. Flynn knew how to talk about emotions rather than lovingly shoulder-punch someone until they went away. He wanted to make Estelle feel better so badly, but he was lost on how to reassure her with words, so the best solution he had was to try to drown the grief out. “Alright, but you should still come to the festival. You can’t help anyone if you wear yourself out, right? Come relax and have some fun so you can go back to work with a fresh-mind tomorrow.”

“Well… ok. You’re probably right.”

She stood up and Yuri internally cheered; at least he’d gotten her out of the library.

Once out of the house, Yuri and Estelle followed the sound of voices to the hill. It was fairly late, but this close to the summer solstice, the sky was still a dull grey with a pink glow just over the treetops. For the first time, Yuri got a true perspective of the population of Yewbrooke, as the entire village had come out for the festival. Yuri was still unsure exactly what the festival would entail, but the cheerful voices, children running around and laughing, and families setting up blankets on the hillside with snacks gave it an inviting atmosphere.

“Reminds me of neighbourhood festivals back when I was a kid,” he said to Estelle. “Though the scenery is a lot nicer than the lower quarter’s muddy streets.”

“That sounds wonderful. I’m jealous; I’ve never experienced a festival before.”

“What, the palace never had any parties?”

Estelle shrugged and smiled at a group of children climbing a tree nearby. “We had parties, but they were always very formal. I always hated them, because I had to wear uncomfortable clothes and walk around getting introduced to boring adults. I was never allowed to talk or have fun or anything like that.”

Yuri wrinkled his nose. “Sounds awful.” He spotted the tavern keeper setting up a table at the top of the hill, where other festival-goers grabbed pints of beer before continuing down to join their friends. Yuri asked, “Hey, Estelle, have you ever had beer before?”

She raised her eyebrows. “Beer? Um, no, I haven’t. I’ve tried wine and champagne, but never beer.”

Yuri wrapped an arm around her waist and pulled her over. “Come on. Let’s get you a proper festival experience.”

“Oh, um, ok.”

Yuri picked up two pints and then led Estelle down the hill to a spot under tree about halfway down. There were families with blankets not far away, but the pair of them were content to sit on the grass. Estelle clutched her glass in both hands and stared at it with fascination before bringing it to her face to take a sip. Her eyes squeezed shut and she spluttered while Yuri grinned at her reaction.

“Ugh!” Estelle had opened her eyes but still looked at Yuri with a wrinkled nose that almost obscured them anyway. “It’s not what I expected at all.”

“What were you expecting?”

“I don’t know.” Estelle inspected her glass and then dared another sip.

“If you hate it, don’t force yourself.” Yuri had set his own drink in the grass. “It’s not like we paid for it.”

“It’s not… awful.” She rolled her fingers around the glass. “I will finish this whole drink!”

“Heh. If you want to.” Yuri smiled at the thought of Flynn’s face if he saw Estelle with beer foam on her upper lip. Yuri craned his neck to gaze around the crowd and then asked, “Do you see Christabel anywhere around here? I figured she’d be here.”

Estelle giggled. “Maybe she’s busy prettying up before she comes to see you.”

Yuri frowned. “Huh?”

“I think she likes you.”

“Huh?”

Estelle tried to raise one eyebrow, but couldn’t, and instead raised both of them so that she looked surprised rather than the intended conspiratorial. “Haven’t you seen the way she looks at you?”

“I… guess it never occurred to me to notice. Isn’t she fifteen or something?”

“Sixteen. I asked.”

Yuri’s mouth twisted with displeasure. “Still. That’s practically Rita’s age.” Which made her basically a baby as far as Yuri’s dating prospects were concerned.

Estelle laughed at how uncomfortable Yuri was. “I didn’t say you had to reciprocate. I mean, you shouldn’t, since she’s so young-”

“I wouldn’t!”

“-but I don’t think it’s too weird for her to have a crush on the exotic older newcomer. You’re strange and exciting and handsome.”

Yuri just kept staring in bewilderment. “Handsome?”

Estelle shrugged. “Sure. Lots of girls think you’re handsome. I heard some of the noble girls in the castle whispering about you when we first got back to Zaphias.”

Mildly uncomfortable but morbidly curious, Yuri asked, “What were they whispering?”

“Oh, you know,” she took another sip of her drink, “stuff like, ‘the commandant’s friend is so dashing for a commoner’ or ‘did you see the princess’s hot boyfriend?’”

Now it was Yuri’s turn to sputter on his drink. “Princess’s hot boyfriend?!”

Estelle laughed and patted Yuri’s shoulder. “Don’t worry, I told them we’re just friends.”

Yuri slowly shook his head and wished he could go back in time to opt-out of this entire conversation. “Ignoring the castle gossip, what should I do about Christabel? Should I tell her to stop liking me, or what?”

“Yuri, you’re really not good at relationship things, are you?”

Yuri sulked with his drink. “I prefer to stay out of that drama.”

“You can’t just tell someone to not like you. Just ignore it; she’ll probably never bring it up. If she does, just gently explain that she’s too young for you to think of that way.”

“Man, this is not the kind of trouble I was expecting when we set out from Zaphias.”

“No… though we haven’t had any of the trouble we were expecting.” Estelle took a big gulp of her drink with her eyes closed, like she wouldn’t taste it if she didn’t see it.

“You really don’t have to force yourself to drink that….”

“I can do it! Anyway, I’ve been thinking about the barrier for this town. Rita once said that animals are sometimes a lot more perceptive than humans when it comes to environmental things. I was thinking, what if there’s something underground giving off magnetic waves that monsters avoid? Or a smell that we don’t notice but wards them off?”

Yuri was glad to go back on a topic other than his secret admirers. “I don’t know much about that sort of stuff, but what sort of smell could be significant enough to drive away monsters but so mild humans can’t sense it?”

“Maybe it’s not the strength of the smell, like with basic barriers, but what the smell is? Maybe it’s a smell they instinctively know is bad news.”

Yuri took a drink as he thought this over. He’d left Repede napping in their room at the great house, but he’d noticed the dog’s tense mood ever since they had arrived. Repede couldn’t articulate what was bothering him, but he was obviously uncomfortable in this town. An odour he knew to be bad, which he could smell while Yuri was oblivious, could explain a lot. “If that’s the case, then the scent would indicate something dangerous, wouldn’t it? Animals only instinctively avoid things that could make them sick or hurt them.”

“That would make sense.”

Yuri looked past Estelle at the thickening crowd of people. “So… if it is dangerous, why isn’t it harming the people of Yewbrooke?”

“Unless it is, and we just don’t notice it.”

Yuri’s mind flashed to the bars on the window of Christabel’s room and then he thought about childhood stories of monsters. “You know… this is a monthly festival synced with the full moon.”

Estelle gasped and leaned forward. In an excited whisper, she said, “Do you think they’re werewolves?”

“It’s probably a coincidence.”

“Yes, but… werewolves.” Estelle almost seemed eager for the theory to be proven true.

Yuri gave her a look. “You want them to be werewolves, don’t you?”

“No,” she lied.

“If they’re werewolves, they’re probably going to try to kill us and it’s going to be horrible.”

“I know! But….” She glanced around just to make sure none of the villagers were listening. “Werewolves.”

“Oh, I get it, you’re hoping for a sexy wolf man to sweep you off your feet.”

“I am not!”

“Didn’t you read a book like that?”

“No.”

“I heard you telling Rita about it. Passion Under the Stars, or something?”

“It was Love Beneath the Moon, and no, I’m not thinking of it at all.”

Yuri couldn’t stop laughing, and Estelle’s huffy expression just egged him on.

He finally stopped when a new person arrived and said, “What’s the joke?” It turned out to be Mr. Cranmer, the village blacksmith whom Yuri had met the first time he went to the Magpie. He sat on the grass near Estelle and stretched out his legs. “You don’t mind if I join you, do you? I’m a bit lost without my wife to sit with, but she’s due any day now and is staying in bed.”

“Of course not,” Estelle said with a smile that showed a hint of fear that he was secretly a werewolf.

Yuri leaned forward to talk to him around Estelle. “So, what actually happens at these festivals?”

“Oh, it’s pretty simple. First there’s an offering to the Crukh, then usually some music and a lot of drinking.”

“That sounds nice,” Estelle said. “Um, what sort of offering?”

“Oh, just-” The crash of the beer table toppling over kept him from explaining. A chorus of shouts and disappointed grumbling followed as a man picked himself up mumbling an apology. “For heaven’s sake,” Cranmer said with a roll of his eyes.

“Sorry!” the clumsy man drawled and swayed a little more. “I’ll help ya clean that….”

“Just go,” the barman said, shoving him away. “If you want to get wasted, stay at home and do it.”

“Jus’ try’na participate in my community,” the man slurred, and then gave the onlookers a rude gesture before staggering away. The man shoved through the crowd while the surrounding villagers muttered to themselves and picked up the mess he had caused.

“Was that Gideon?” Estelle asked, trying to see through the crowd even though he was almost out of view by now.

Cranmer rolled his eyes. “Sure was. He always gets drunk before coming to any social event, as if it’s some huge burden he has to be loaded to endure. Bit of an odd duck, overall.”

“Why does he come at all?” Yuri asked.

Cranmer gave him a confused look. “What do you mean?”

“If he hates these festivals so much, why doesn’t he just stay home?”

“Well he’s got to come. This is how we give thanks to the Crukh for all that he does for us. Gideon may be a grumpy loner, but he lives off the Crukh’s bounty all the same.”

Yuri nodded in idle agreement, while wondering how many people were here out of social obligation rather than any desire to earnestly worship their god.

“Oh, look, we’re about to start.” Cranmer pointed down the hill, to where Christabel was standing in front of a pair of wooden posts about an arm-span apart.

They were set into the ground about ten feet up from the riverbank. Someone had tied a rappig to one of the posts, and it snuffled the ground between them. Behind Christabel, in the river, a small wooden raft had been brought out to bob in the gentle current. A rope from the raft anchored it to the other post. As Christabel took her position at the riverside, the crowd fell still and took their seats across the lawn. Estelle leaned forward, curious.

“Good evening!” Christabel’s voice carried over the quiet village. “Thank you all for coming to our final offering of the year.”

The sudden chorus of voices saying, “We are gladly here,” startled Yuri, who had been about to ask Cranmer what she meant by final offering of the year, when it was still only a few days out from the start of summer. Estelle caught his eye and put a finger to her lips, and he agreed to keep his questions to the end.

“On this night,” Christabel continued, “we thank the Crukh for keeping us safe for these many years of isolation.”

“Thank you,” the crowd murmured.

“We thank the Crukh for blessing us with health and friendship.”

This time Yuri was ready for the crowd, and Cranmer right beside him, to chant, “Thank you.”

“We thank the Crukh for providing us with plentiful food and clean water.”

“Thank you.”

“We thank the Crukh for guiding our new friends Yuri and Estelle to us, and allowing them to share their outsider perspectives with us.”

This time the thanks were a little more staggered, and the heads turning their way were more curious and uncertain than supportive.

“To show our thanks for all the Crukh has done for us, tonight we give back only a small fraction of everything he has given us.”

Estelle gasped and Yuri grimaced. He’d had a feeling it was heading to this ever since he saw the rappig tied up behind her, and pictured the piece of pork that had been thrown into the fire on the first night - and on all subsequent nights - as an offering.

“No,” Estelle whispered, “she’s not going to kill that poor rappig, is she?”

“You eat rappig,” Yuri whispered back. “They’re killed before you eat them.”

She creased her brow and pursed her lips at him. “That’s different.”

Cranmer glanced at them and Yuri gave Estelle the same shushing gesture she’d give him earlier.

The last rays of the setting sun reflected on the silver blade Christabel pulled from her belt. Yuri tensed at the sight and he forced himself not to look away. Despite his words to Estelle, he wasn’t keen on watching on animal get butchered, either. Sure, he intellectually knew where his meat came from, but it was one thing to enjoy a steak and quite another to see it happen.

Estelle was sitting with her hands folded around her mouth and nose, ready to extend their cover to her eyes at a moment’s notice. Christabel brought the knife down… and cut through the rope. Estelle let out a sigh of relief as Christabel took the rope in hand and guided the rappig onto the raft just behind them. It stayed there as she stepped off and picked up a long wooden pole that had been sitting on the bank but obscured by dusk’s shadows. Estelle had fully lowered her arms by the time Christabel used the pole to push the raft away from the bank.

“This we give to the Crukh!” she shouted as she pushed. The hillside echoed the words back and Yuri didn’t think he would ever stop finding it creepy. They continued to chorus, “Please accept our offering, and continue to give us your mercy in return.”

The raft bumped into the opposite bank, about ten feet away from where Christabel stood. The rappig, who had looked around warily as it was pushed on a floating wooden platform, saw solid ground ahead and hurried off the raft. Christabel slipped the pole into a loop on the raft to drag it back, leaving the rappig on the opposite bank. It was hard to make out in the dim light, but Yuri thought he could see a faint path leading away from the river. The rappig looked around and then, drawn by the prospect of food down the path, wandered away from the bank.

“Is that it?” Estelle asked quietly, hopefully. “No one is going to slaughter a rappig?”

“The Crukh will,” Cranmer explained in an equally low voice. “He likes to kill his offerings himself.”

“Pleasant guy,” Yuri automatically muttered, and then regretted it when he saw the judgemental look Cranmer gave him.

“Thank you, everyone,” Christabel called out. “Now, let us celebrate the life the Crukh has provided for us!”

The community cheered, Christabel picked up a fiddle, and music swept over the hillside. At first, the audience sat in rapture as her vibrant notes lightened the solemn mood. Yuri was no expert on music, his exposure mostly limited to whatever local felt like playing in The Comet on a rainy evening, but he thought Christabel was excellent. His hand began tapping the rhythm into the grass and the upbeat music drowned out the litany of anxious thoughts stirring in the back of his mind.

“She’s very good,” Estelle said with a smile, which must be better praise than if Yuri had said it, considering the calibre of musicians surely employed at the castle.

“Yes, she is,” Cranmer said with a proud smile. “Everyone is quite fond of her.”

“You change princes or princesses on the summer solstice, right?” Yuri asked. “That’s next week. So term is almost up?”

Cranmer nodded glumly. “That’s right. We’re all going to miss having her. I’m sure the next prince or princess will be great, too, but… we’re all quite attached to her. You know she’s an orphan, right? So, the whole town looked after her when she was growing up.”

That was enough for Yuri to completely understand her relationship with the village.

While they were talking, the crowd had begun to get to their feet and by now many of them were dancing. By the river, Christabel had her eyes closed and lost herself in her music. Yuri watched her for a few seconds, but his eyes were drawn to the path across the river, which was now shrouded heavily in shadow.

“Where does that path lead?” He pointed ahead.

“The path?” Cranmer seemed surprised. “It goes to the Crukh.”

Yuri raised an eyebrow. “What, does he have a mailing address or something?”

Cranmer seemed confused and just repeated, “It leads to him.”

“So, he lives at the end of it?” Estelle asked. “Does he have a home, like a cave or a cottage or… I don’t know, a lair?”

Cranmer shook his head and shrugged. “Nobody knows. We don’t go across the river.”

“Someone had to make that path,” Yuri said.

Cranmer spoke slowly, like he thought Yuri and Estelle were slow. “The Crukh made the path.”

“How long has it been there?” Yuri was starting to get annoyed by how every single questioned in thsi village was answered with ‘the Crukh.’

“It’s the Crukh’s path. He made it, and it’s always been there. We release rappigs over there, and his presence draws them along the path to reach him.”

Estelle was staring across the river with curiosity, and Yuri knew what she was going to propose before she even said it. “Let’s follow the trail and see what we can learn about the Crukh.”

Yuri was about to agree, because he was curious, too, but Cranmer gave a stern look.

“You can’t cross the river. Nobody crosses the river. That’s the Crukh’s territory, and we must not trespass.”

Estelle tried, “I’m sure it’s fine if we just-”

“It’s forbidden.” Cranmer was started to get agitated. “It is one of our oldest laws. We do not trespass on the Crukh’s land. He carved out this plot of land to keep safe for us; the least we can do is not intrude on his own.”

Yuri wanted to argue with Estelle, but doubt held him back. The doubt came with the sound of a door clicking shut, and the fear of what might happen if they broke another law. Would he be able to protect Estelle if the Crukh came for them in the night? His chest ached at the thought.

“We understand,” Estelle said soothingly. “We don’t want to violate your laws. If it’s so important to your village, we promise to stay out.”

This pacified Cranmer, and he rose to join the festivities. He held out a hand for Estelle, offering to dance with her, and so Estelle left Yuri sitting by the tree to twirl around with a laugh and a smile before jumping over to dance with a new partner. Yuri watched, content, as she experienced her first real party. Based on her smile, it seemed to have successfully distracted her from her work in the library. The night wore on, and the unsettling chanting of the ritual that had started the festival faded to the back of Yuri’s mind as he got lost in the music and good spirits.

About two hours in, a young woman came running down the path. She paused at the edge of the dancing, cupped her hands around her mouth, and yelled, “Cranmer! Hey, Cranmer! The baby’s coming!”

The crowd burst into a roar of applause and Yuri spotted Cranmer from the convergence of back-slapping.

Estelle jumped to her feet. “I should help.” She had already run off before Yuri had finished getting up.

Estelle converged with Cranmer and the young woman at the road. “Excuse me! I can help!”

Cranmer gave her an odd look. “Uh, thanks? We’ve got it covered.”

“I know healing artes,” Estelle explained. “And I’ve studied first aid. Please, let me help.”

The young woman laughed. “What, do babies in Zaphias rip out through the stomach? You don’t need healing artes for a body’s natural functions.”

Yuri had come up behind Estelle by this point, and while Estelle was too flummoxed to reply, he said, “Yeah, but shit happens, doesn’t it? It would probably be good to have a healer on hand in case things go south.”

Cranmer looked bemused. “Thanks for the offer, but we really don’t need any help. I’ll come get you if I trip on something an twist me ankle, yeah?”

The two of them walked away, laughing in high spirits. Yuri watched them go while feeling like he’d side-stepped into a parallel universe that was just slightly off.

“Is that normal outside the lower quarter?” Yuri asked. In his experience, labour was a medical emergency. A man reacting so cavalierly to his wife giving birth in the lower quarter would be unheard of.

“No,” Estelle said, still watching them go. “Even in the castle, with healers available and a clean and save infirmary, women almost always write up their will when they get progenant, just in case.”

“Yeah. We don’t do wills in the lower quarter, but pregnant women always make arrangements for what should happen to the other children or their possession, just in case.” And those arrangements became relevant at least a handful of times a year in the lower quarter.

“Everyone says the Crukh keeps them healthy and safe from illness. Could he really have the power to make childbirth a risk-free event?”

“He would have to exist for that to be the case.”

“Something about this town is obviously affecting things. They haven’t had a dangerous birth in so many generations that the idea that anything could happen to a mother is alien to them.”

“Yeah. It’s weird but… it kinda sounds nice.” He’d too often seen recent widowers drowning their grief in The Comet, sometimes with a new baby, and sometimes not. Yewbrooke was stifling, and even now he felt the eyes of the woods boring into him, but he had to admit… it sounded kind of nice to live in a town where that never happened.

* * *

Close to midnight, with the sun well set and the only light coming from the full moon, the party had died out and Yuri and Estelle were the only people still outside. They stood on the riverbank, with a hill of trampled earth and dropped food stretching up behind them.

“Glad you came?” Yuri asked.

“Yes. It was so much fun.” Estelle balanced on a boulder that sat half in the water, making her a head taller than him. “When we get back to Zaphias, we should have a proper party with all our friends.”

“Sounds nice.” Yuri rested a hand on his hip and nudged the raft, tied once more to one of the wooden posts.

More seriously, she said, “I’ve been thinking about that path across the river.”

Yuri wasn’t even surprised. “You want to follow it anyway, don’t you?”

“I want to say we shouldn’t… these people have been so hospitable to us, and violating what seems to be an important law for them doesn’t seem right. But… the truth about the Crukh might lie at the end of that path, and with that, the truth about how to keep a village safe without blastia.”

Despite his hesitations of breaking another law, he knew she was right. “I agree. I don’t think we should go immediately, though. I want to know a bit more about what exactly the Crukh is before we go barging into its lair. Can you wait?”

She nodded. “Yes. The last time we barged into the unknown to find a monster, we almost died of dehydration. I’ve learned my lesson.”

“Good.” For a long moment, they stood by the river and listened to its current flow over the rocks. Yuri stared into the darkness of the path and, now that the music was no longer around to distract his hyperactive imagination, started wondering about all the horrors that lay at the end of it. Was he leading Estelle into danger? What if there was nothing on the path but hungry monsters and this decision to investigate would lead to Estelle being killed? Himself being killed? The world being destroyed?

How could it possibly end in the world being destroyed? A little rational voice tried to speak over the rising thoughts.

It might, the thoughts replied. Decisions made in the past had included the world being destroyed as possible outcomes. So what if this time, he did the wrong thing and everyone he loved died?

Yuri missed the days when he could barge into danger without these intrusive thoughts forcing his brain through a worst-case-scenario gauntlet.

“Yuri.” Estelle’s hand landed on his shoulder and her voice had come as a whisper.

At first, Yuri thought his stressing had become visible and she was trying to calm him down, but then he noticed she was staring into the treetops on the other side of the river. Yuri followed her gaze and spotted the trees swaying the distance. The canopies rustled as if something very large was moving through the tall, narrow trees. “The wind,” Yuri said.

“Yes… must be.” Estelle still had her hand on Yuri’s shoulder as the pair stared, transfixed, at the movement of the trees. “It’s just… blowing only on that one spot.”


	6. Something in the Trees

Estelle couldn’t sleep. Her energy from the festival was fading, but it sent her slumping into a sea of guilt over having fun. While she danced and laughed and enjoyed herself, someone out there was suffering because the blastia were gone. What right did she have to have fun when it was her fault others were suffering? Sitting back and enjoying herself was selfish, just like it had been selfish to choose to live at the cost of the world.

Yuri was asleep, so she slipped out of bed as quietly as she could. Yuri slept so restlessly lately; she couldn’t bear to disturb him. Repede looked up when she reached the door, but she put her fingers to her lips and whispered, “Stay with Yuri. I’m just going to the library.”

Once in the library, she fumbled in the dark for a candle and then settled in at her table once more. She was on the verge of a major breakthrough; she just knew it. She had copied the symbols on a few of the papers when they inspected the barrier, and she thought she had enough of the alphabet worked out to transliterate it into her own alphabet.

She worked through the word letter by letter. It had been written in large print in the middle of the paper, with other words running around the edges in a smaller print. The one in the middle was probably the most important, so when she finished transliterating it, she expected to have a puzzle solved. Instead, she was met with another puzzle.

“Josephine,” Estelle whispered. “Josephine?” It was just a person’s a name? She had expected something more… mystical.

She froze when she heard footsteps on the staircase. Estelle listened to them come down, and then couldn’t hold her curiosity back any longer. She pushed the door open and peeked out to see Christabel crossing the hall with a single candle for light. She opened the front door and left the building.

People don’t go outside at night. That was one of the first things they learned when they got here. So where was she going?

Estelle considered going to get Yuri and Repede, but Yuri was so stressed and she didn’t want to worry him. So, she went alone to creep out the front door and into the dark night. The moment she stepped out, a shiver overtook her despite the warm air. She remembered their fright the night they had arrived and told herself she was just paranoid from the village’s obsession with their god. She put those fears aside and took off across the main square and to the dirt road leading south along the river.

Christabel’s candle was the only light, making it easy to follow her. Estelle was good at sneaking about after spending a childhood trying to sneak into the library after bedtime. The brightness of the nearly-full moon made it harder, but she managed to stick to the shadows near the houses. As far as she could tell, Christabel didn’t have any idea that she was being followed.

Estelle, though, had a creeping suspicion that she was. A soft shuffling, so quiet her ears strained to pick it up, fell silent the moment she paused to listen closer. Estelle looked over her shoulder and saw nothing but the dark road. A stray cat, maybe. Christabel’s candle was still moving onward, so Estelle tried to put it out of her mind and continue.

It was difficult, though. Every few steps, she felt a prickling at the back of her neck and turned around to see who had poked their head out of a cottage, only to find the road deserted. Did Christabel feel this way? She seemed to be walking without worry, but Estelle felt like a monster was going to lunge at her exposed back any second now. She paused next to a cottage and peered over her shoulder for the dozenth time, saw nothing, and turned her eyes back to -

Estelle whipped her head back. There had been something there! Her heart lurched and she tried to make out what she had seen. Then she wished she hadn’t. Something stood in the patch of darkness where trees met the road - something bipedal, but far taller than her, hunched over and gangly. She could only make out a silhouette, other than two points of light reflecting in eyes high above the road that were looking directly at her.

Then the eyes blinked away, she detected movement in the darkness, and then her straining eyes couldn’t make out the shape any longer. It must have retreated further into the trees, but she suddenly wished it would come back so that she at least knew where it was.

Estelle felt like a tree herself, with roots digging into the ground and keeping her from moving. She felt certain that as soon as she turned her back, the thing would come out again. But what was to say it wasn’t already circling around to approach her from behind? She was all alone and exposed and wished fervently that she had just stayed in the library.

She wasn’t alone out here, though. Christabel was out here as well, but the longer she stood here paralyzed, the farther away Christabel got. Standing here until dawn was unfeasible, and going back to the great house now would mean passing that copse of trees where the thing had stood, so her best option was to follow Christabel further down the road.

Don’t look back, Estelle said over and over to herself as she turned to follow Christabel’s little point of light. If she looked back and saw nothing, she would panic over where it was now. If she looked back and saw it in the distance, that wouldn’t change her course of action. If she looked back and saw it right behind her… well, there wouldn’t be anything she could do about that, anyway. So she looked straight ahead, told herself she would be fine, and ignored the prickling on the back of her neck that hinted something was drawing very, very near.

Christabel left the road and pushed through the weeds to reach the door of her hold house. The door shut, and her light was gone. It had been small, but the loss of that little candle light made Estelle feel very alone. She quickened her pace and felt a swell of relief when she reached Christabel’s house. Once she turned onto the path, she finally let herself glance down the road. Clouds had moved across the moon, swathing the world in darkness. If anything was out there, she couldn’t tell.

Estelle pressed through the weeds to reach the front window and huddled against the wall. Just having a solid structure to stand against made her feel safer. She peeked through the window and saw that Christabel had left the candle on the table while she rummaged through a trunk against the wall. What was she looking for that she couldn’t come get during the day?

Something moved behind her. Estelle smashed her hand over her mouth to smother a cry. She went rigged as she listened to weeds rustle. A tiny, childish part of her pressed against the wall as if the shadows of the cottage could actually conceal her at this point. Her hand, still pressed firmly over her mouth to hold in a whimper, shook. Hot breath hit the back of her neck and she squeezed her eyes shut.

More than anything else, she felt guilty. She felt horrible, painful guilt over her imminent death because they’d damned the world to save her life, and she had wasted it. She couldn’t let herself die here! She owed it to everyone who was hurting because of her to keep on living and find a way to help them! She needed to turn around, face the monster, and find a way to overcome it.

The front door slammed open. “Estelle?”

Estelle gasped and twisted around. “Christabel!”

Christabel grabbed her arm and dragged Estelle through the threshold without a word. She slammed the door shut and said, “What were you doing out there?!”

“I’m sorry! I heard you leave and I was curious, so I followed you. I know I shouldn’t have. What was that outside?” She looked over her shoulder at the door in case something tried to burst through.

“What was what?”

“The… the monster.”

Christabel bit her lip and glanced out the window. She shook her head tightly. “I didn’t see anything. Come sit down.”

Estelle joined Christabel at the dusty table and sat across a candle from her. Above them was the strip of fabric hanging from a hook she’d seen from outside. It was just a strip of linen, somewhere between one and two feet long, and had a single character drawn on it in a dark ink. On the table was an old drawing of a child and two stick figure parents. It was drawn with charcoal, which had long since smudged and faded. Estelle wanted to ask about it, but she had more pressing concerns.

“Christabel, please, what is going on? I know there was something out there.”

“We don’t go outside at night for a reason,” Christabel said. “You’re lucky I’m here. I don’t know if you would have made it back to the great house alone.”

Estelle couldn’t suppress a shudder. “Was it… the Crukh himself?”

Christabel just shrugged. “Maybe? An aspect of him, perhaps. I really don’t know.”

“Ok, then why did you come out?”

“I’m the princess. He won’t harm me, not this close to the solstice. You should be ok on the way back if you’re with me.”

“Ok….” Estelle looked around the cottage, and though it was hard to see with only one candle for light, she could tell there was at least one more room, probably a bedroom. “Could we not stay here until dawn? Do we have to go back?”

“I don’t want anyone to know I left, so I’m going back. You could stay here, I guess, if you don’t think Yuri would freak out if you’re missing in the morning.”

Estelle thought about how jumpy and stressed Yuri had been lately. She imagined his reaction if he woke up and found her missing and already felt guilty. She couldn’t do that to him, even if the thought of going outside again terrified her. “No, you’re right. I’ll go back with you. But why did you have to sneak here in the middle of the night?”

“I….” She pulled the old drawing close and gazed at the crudely drawn happy faces.

Estelle recognized that look. She’d worn the exact same mixture of nostalgia and crippling pain when she looked at her own childhood drawings of herself and her mother. Softly, she asked, “Why can’t you acknowledge your father around other people? What happened to him?”

Christabel took a heavy breath and pushed the picture away. “My father… didn’t really like Yewbrooke all that much.”

Estelle leaned forward. “He didn’t? Why not?”

“He was angry that my mother had died, and blamed the Crukh. When I was eight, he decided… he decided he’d had enough. He thought the Crukh was cruel, and that he was maliciously controlling our lives. So, he crossed the river to find the Crukh and… I don’t know, demand an apology? Fight him? I’ve never been entirely sure what his plan was. Maybe he didn’t even have one. It doesn’t matter - whatever the reason, he never came back. We have a rule in the village, though. It’s one of the rules I didn’t bring up the other day, because it doesn’t affect you or Yuri, but when someone defies the laws of the village, well, they get excommunicated. My father turned his back on Yewbrooke’s ways and traditions, intruded into the Crukh’s territory, confronted him….” She sighed and moved her hand to rest on the old drawing. “As far as anyone is concerned, he doesn’t exist. He’s not allowed to exist - if we acknowledge him, we acknowledge that one of us defied the Crukh, which might invite his punishment on us all.”

Estelle’s mouth had slowly slipped open while listening to Christabel talk. When she finished, Estelle said, “Oh my goodness. That’s horrible. You aren’t allowed to talk about him at all? But he’s your father!”

Christabel smiled awkwardly and shrugged. “That’s how we do things here.”

“When my mother died, she left me a memento. It was just a little embroidered flower, but it meant so much to me. When I was little, I would carry it in my pocket all day, and I’d pull it out to squeeze and press to my face whenever I missed her too much. To not even be allowed to acknowledge you’re grieving… oh, Christabel, that sounds so cruel.” Estelle reached out to rest her hand on the other girl’s.

Christabel pulled away and picked up her old picture. “I was supposed to throw away anything that referenced him, anything he gave me. I hid a few things, though. I’ve kept them here to remember him by. I come out here at night sometimes just to look through it on days when….”

Estelle just nodded. She knew what that days were like.

“I’m sure I would be in a lot of trouble with the village if it was ever found, so, luckily it’s still a secret.” She winked at Estelle. “You won’t tell anyone, will you?”

“Of course not!”

“Thank you. I think I’m ready to head back now, though.”

Estelle looked outside and shuddered at the thought of exposing herself to the darkness once again. But, she’d already agreed that she couldn’t stay here. Just to put it off for another minute, she asked, “What is this cloth hanging above us?”

Christabel’s eyes drifted upward. “Oh, it’s… something like a talisman. Every house has one. On the solstice, the prince or princess marks them with blood, signing their initial. They’re then put up in every house as symbolic protection. It tells the Crukh ‘please protect this house,’ basically.”

“It’s marked with blood?” Looking closer, she could see that the ink was indeed the dark brown of dried blood. “Doesn’t it hurt to use that much blood?”

“I’m sure it does a little, but it’s an honoured tradition.”

It seemed to Estelle that this village could do with a little less tradition, but she held her tongue.

“Are you ready to head back?”

Estelle wasn’t, but she had to, so she nodded. She waited for Christabel to put the drawing away and tidy up any evidence that they had been there, and then followed her into the night.

She expected to see the monster as soon as she stepped outside, but the night was quiet. Christabel’s candle made a small puddle of light, and as they walked, it seemed to repel any dark shapes from slinking after them. Estelle heard nothing, and didn’t even feel the overwhelming sense of being followed that she had on the way here. Maybe whatever had been out there had moved on, or maybe her fear had been imagined and walking with another person soothed it.

They returned to the great house with no problems, and Estelle quietly slipped into her room to find Yuri still asleep. Good. Repede looked up when she entered, but she just gave him a smile and put her finger to her lips before getting back into bed. In the morning, Yuri would be upset with her for sneaking out, but for now she was just glad to be safe in her bed, with the night locked on the other side of the door.

* * *

Once again, Yuri woke up frantic and sweaty from a nightmare. He lay in bed and stared at the ceiling as he took deep breaths. Shit. Shit. Why did this keep happening? He couldn’t even remember what it had been about now. Something about swaying trees and teeth in the dark. He sat up, rubbing his face. Repede had raised his head from his spot between the beds and cautiously wagged his tail as he watched Yuri.

“I’m fine,” he muttered to the dog.

He turned away from Repede’s judgemental expression and found himself looking through the balcony doors to the forest again. The grey light of dawn sapped colour from the trees, making all their green cool and dull. A flock of birds suddenly took flight in the distance. Something in the woods must have disturbed them. Something very large, with threatening teeth and all-encompassing power over the forest, perhaps? Yuri scowled and told himself not to be ridiculous.

“What are you looking at?”

Yuri flinched at the sudden voice and turned around. Estelle sat up in bed, her sheet pulled up around her knees.

“Sorry. Didn’t mean to wake you.”

“It’s fine; I was already awake.” She pushed some messy pink hair behind her ears and added, “Were you having a nightmare, too?”

Yuri was about to deny by instinct, but stopped himself when he processed the ‘too’. “You, too, huh?”

She smiled sadly. “Seems like we have something in common.”

Yuri turned away from the balcony, though for some reason the voice of an old sergeant from his knight training days passed through his brain to say, never turn your back on an enemy. He shook that thought away and said, “What was yours about?”

“It started out nice. I dreamed we were at the festival, and I was dancing with everyone and trying delicious foods and we were all laughing and having fun. But then the music stopped and I went up the hill to return to the village… only it wasn’t Yewbrooke. It was Midbell.” Her fingers clenched around the sheet over her knees. “And while we were dancing and having fun, monsters had invaded and killed so many people. All those people died and it was all my fault. Only, that part wasn’t just a dream, was it?”

“Midbell wasn’t your fault,” Yuri said instantly.

“I know. We’ve talked about this before. And even if I’m not sure how I feel about that yet, I do know that I feel so guilty about all the fun we had last night. I was dancing and drinking, and meanwhile, somewhere in the world, monsters were surely attacking people who are no longer protected by blastia.”

“You can’t shun ever being happy again,” Yuri said gently. “You don’t have to force yourself to be miserable just because some people are.”

“I do, though.”

Yuri left his bed to sit on hers and wrap an arm around her shoulders. “Alright. I’m not going to yell at you to stop blaming yourself. You can stop doing that when you’re ready. Until then, just know that I don’t blame you for having fun even though others aren’t.”

Estelle flopped her head against his shoulder. “Thank you, Yuri. And, maybe while you’re still feeling sorry for me, I can tell you what I did last night.”

Yuri straightened up somewhat. “Uh… what did you do?”

“I saw Christabel leaving the house, so I followed her.”

“Outside?” Yuri hated how shocked and nervous the concept of going outside at night made him feel. This was how the villagers would react, and he didn’t want to think this town was starting to rub off on him.

“Yes. I followed her to her old house.”

“You’re ok, though? There wasn’t anything out there?”

“I’m ok, yes. I think… well, it was a bit spooky but I’m ok.”

Estelle smiled, but Yuri noticed a distinct lack of confirming there had been nothing out there. ‘I’m ok’ was not the same thing as ‘nothing happened.’ Self-hatred roared up inside him - Estelle could have gotten killed last night and he’d slept through it. He shouldn’t have slept. He should have stayed awake all night. How dare he allow himself to relax when he had so much on his shoulders that it crushed his back and suffocated him from the stress.

“I learned some things from Christabel, though. She told me about her father.”

Yuri dragged his attention out of his own self-loathing. “Oh, yeah?”

“Her father rejected the village and crossed the river to face the Crukh. He never came back, so he’s assumed to be dead. Because he defied the laws, though, the village excommunicated him so thoroughly that nobody will even acknowledge that he existed.”

Yuri grimaced. “What the hell? You can’t even mention a dead guy?”

“I know, it’s awful. It turns out that Christabel snuck out because she keeps mementos of him in their old house, and she wanted to visit.”

Yuri smirked. “Seems like our princess has a pretty flippant attitude toward the laws.”

Estelle managed a tiny smile. “Sometimes princesses have to admit when the laws are broken, and don’t deserve to be followed.”

“Oof, don’t let Flynn hear you say that. He’ll yell at me for corrupting you.”

She giggled a little. “I think he’s accepted that I’m well and fully corrupted by now. But, Yuri, I’ve been thinking more about our plan to follow the path. It’s just… Christabel’s dad crossed the river, and he never came back. And I think… I think something is out there, in the woods. Maybe it isn’t a good idea to go.”

Yuri really wanted to agree. He hated that blasted forest and every time he looked at it, his stress spiked. However, his embarrassment at letting something like this freak him out coupled with his desire to do something to help the world convinced him to ignore his fears. “An unarmed civilian heading into the Quoi Woods alone would probably never make it back, but we got through just fine.”

“I know, but in Desier, I almost got all of you killed because I stupidly decided to barge into the desert in search of answers. I can’t make that mistake again.”

“Ok. You stay here, and Repede and I will check out the path.”

“What?” She balled her hands into fists. “Yuri, that wasn’t my point. I don’t want to protect myself, I want to protect you.”

Yuri faltered a little at that. Estelle was the person he protected; he didn’t know how to deal with the idea of her protecting him. “Don’t worry about me. I want to know what’s at the end of that path, too. The sooner we learn how this village is protected, the sooner we can get out of here. Repede and I can handle it.”

“You’re not going without me.”

“Figured you’d say that.”

“So, we’re settled then. We’re both going. Before that, though, I want to learn as much as possible. I was thinking about talking to Gideon.”

Yuri nodded. “Makes sense. He seems like a bit of an outsider to the community. Might be more willing to talk about things.”

“That’s right. If anyone in this village is going to give us straight answers, it will be him.”

* * *

An hour later, dressed and breakfasted, Yuri and Estelle stood outside Gideon’s house. It was set off the road, as much as the dirt paths counted as roads. A smoldering kiln of logs in a conical heap beside the little stone house was responsible for the smoky scent.

Gideon answered after Yuri’s third attempt at banging on the door. He pushed it open while mumbling, “Alright, alright, I’m here, what - oh.” He held the door open and stared at the pair of strangers. “What do you lot want?”

“Good morning!” Estelle said. “We were hoping-”

Gideon waved a hand and covered his ears. “Excuse me, sorry, I am very hungover this morning so if we could do this in a whisper, I would appreciate that.”

Estelle deflated and tried again. “Oh, um, sorry. We were hoping we could talk with you about this town and the Crukh.”

Gideon rolled his eyes. “Go talk to the princess. That’s her job.”

He started to close the door, but Yuri stopped it with his foot. “We have. We’ve talked to everyone else quite a bit, but we thought you could give us a different perspective.”

“Please, sir?” Estelle folded her hands together. “We just want to understand what’s going on in this village.”

“I’m not your historian.” He yanked the door past Yuri’s foot and slammed it.

Estelle looked to Yuri with a frown, and Yuri immediately started banging on the door again. “Hey, it’s alright!” he shouted. “Personally, when I’m hungover, I hate it when a couple idiots stand outside my door and bang on it for hours, but you do you!” He kept knocking. Estelle got the hint and joined in.

Less than thirty seconds later, the door burst open with enough force to whack Yuri in the forehead, which he probably deserved.

“Alright, alright!” Gideon shouted. “Come in and get this over with.”

“Thank you, Mr. Gideon!” Estelle’s smile was innocent.

Yuri’s was not. “Ah, a change of heart? How nice.”

In a polite word, Gideon’s home was rustic. In two less polite words, it was run down. The wooden furniture would have been called antiques if they had been better maintained, but as they were, a better description was ‘crumbling’. Dented pewter pots sat on a cast iron wood stove, and the back window with a view to the forest hadn’t been washed in so long that they failed at the core functions of being windows.

“Your home is, um, lovely,” Estelle said as she stood in the middle of the room and carefully didn’t touch anything.

Gideon ignored the lie and beelined for the point. “What do you want to know about the damned village?”

Having barged into his home when he was hungover and grouchy, Yuri would at least pay him the courtesy of not beating around the bush. “What exactly is the Crukh?”

Gideon slumped into a chair at the table in the middle of the room. He picked up a bottle of the same beer the tavern had been selling last night (probably the only brew available in town) and downed a gulp. Estelle’s lips parted like she was about to question if he should really be drinking when he was already hungover, and then thought better of it.

“I don’t know what it is.”

Yuri’s hopes drooped. If anyone in the village would tell them the truth, he’d been sure it would be Gideon. “You have no idea at all?”

“I know it’s fucked up, is what I know.”

Estelle forced herself to stop inspecting the kitchen area, probably because figuring out how long some of the dishes had been sitting on the counter would depress her. “How is it, um, screwed up?”

“You two have any experience farming? Animal husbandry?”

The sudden question made Yuri and Estelle glance at each other and then Yuri said, “Uh… I definitely have no experience with having an animal husband.”

Estelle burst into laughter and Gideon snorted into another drink. It was now his turn to share a look with Estelle, and then she quickly explained, “Yuri, animal husbandry doesn’t mean, um, treating an animal like a husband…. It’s raising animals, like on a farm.”

“Oh.” He really wished she and Gideon would stop looking at him like that. It wasn’t his fault he’d grown up in a warren of paved alleys and city walls and not a rural village. If asked where rappigs came from, most people in the lower quarter would reply, ‘the butcher’.

Gideon coughed to clear his throat. “Anyway. We have a lot of livestock in Yewbrooke. Rappigs, chickens, and the like. Farmers here take great care of their animals, like I assume they do out in your world, too. Can’t get a good steak if the cow grows up sickly and starved, right?”

Yuri nodded in slow agreement, already not liking the direction this story was going in.

“So when I was a lad, my mom put me in charge of taking care of the chickens. I loved that job. Gave ‘em all names and everything. Then one day, my mom came out, grabbed one of my fine feathery friends, and lopped his head right off. I cried and I cried. So, my mom holds me tight and explains how it is for farming. We have to kill them, see? We need to eat. And those chickens would live short, violent lives out in the wilderness. They’re lucky to be on our farms. We look after our animals, care for them, feed them, give them everything they need - and then we butcher them. As my mom put it, on a proper farm, animals live the best possible lives they could… and then have just one bad day. I guess the Crukh’s an even kinder farmer - he only butchers one a year.”

Estelle gasped and put her hand to her mouth, while Yuri met Gideon’s eyes with grim acceptance.

Estelle spoke first. “But… who? When? Why?”

Gideon made a face somewhere between a grin and a grimace. “Ever wonder why the dear princess only serves for one year?”

“So that’s it, is it?” Yuri folded his arms. He hadn’t exactly assumed that the village sacrificed people as well as food and rappigs, but that new piece of information fit seamlessly into the puzzle. “Drive the prince or princess into the woods like the rappig after the end of the year?”

“You fucking wish.” Gideon shook his head with a scowl. “Every damn year, they tie the poor bastard up between those posts by the river and leave ‘em out there. There’s always a lot of screaming that night. Next morning, posts are empty.”

“Oh.” Estelle looked sick.

This was the part that surprised Yuri. He could understand driving a sacrifice into the woods to get mauled by an eggbear, but what kind of monster came to town on cue, killed one person, and then left? That was no normal monster. Tension strained Yuri’s mind. If that story was true, then there really was something in those woods. Something that stirred the trees. Something that watched them in the night. “What does the Crukh actually look like?”

“No idea. We leave the offering out at sunset, and don’t leave our homes again until dawn.”

“And everyone just goes along with this?” Estelle asked, her face full of horror and disgust. “The whole village is on board with sacrificing a person every year?”

“Not everyone likes it.” Gideon took another swig of beer that indicated he was one of them. “But it’s a whole carrot and stick situation. Give the Crukh the sacrifice it wants, and it gives us back safety, plentiful food, good weather, all that crap. Deny the offering, and it’ll raze the village to the ground and slaughter us all.”

“How do you know?” Estelle asked. “I’ve read about ancient cultures that thought they had to sacrifice people or else the sun would go out, but in our modern time we know that isn’t possible.”

“The Crukh is real,” Gideon said. “We know he takes the sacrifice each year. What reason do we have to doubt he’d follow through on the threat?”

“When did he give this threat?” Yuri asked. “I mean… he doesn’t seem like a chatty guy.”

Gideon shrugged. “How exactly Yewbrooke entered into this arrangement with him isn’t recorded.”

Yuri frowned. “So… what if that isn’t true at all? What if the Crukh is just some intelligent monster that enjoys getting a free meal each year and doesn’t actually have the power to punish you for not giving in?”

Estelle nodded while looking between Yuri and Gideon. “Yes, that is very possible. You don’t actually have any proof that the whole village will die if you don’t sacrifice someone.”

“Would you be willing to risk it?” Gideon fixed his eyes on her. “Option A, we continue the sacrifice and one person definitely dies. Option B, we don’t give a sacrifice and three hundred people might die. Option A has a lot less death.”

“So leave,” Yuri said with tight anger. “Leave this rotten forest and let it smash up empty buildings. That’s option C, where nobody dies.”

“And go where? Your empire? Dealing with monster attacks daily, famine, drought, tyrannical government? The situation we’re in is fucked to hell, but I’d take it over dying of some common illness in the outside world. At least here, only one day is miserable, not all of them.”

There were a lot of things Yuri wanted to say about this situation, and from the way Estelle was gearing up beside him, she had many more, but they had barged in and promised to make this short, so Yuri nudged her and bit his tongue. “Alright. So, Christabel is the one on the chopping block this year, huh?”

“That’s right. Whole town’s upset about it. Summer solstice is just a few days away, so she’ll be meeting the Crukh soon.”

“She never mentioned…” Estelle said. “What can we do?” Estelle looked between Yuri and Gideon with concern. “We can’t let Christabel get murdered by this… this monster, whatever it is!”

“You’re in a pickle, then,” Gideon said, “since dear Princess Christabel is also on board with getting killed for the good of the village.”

“Then we’ll stop her.”

“If you have any sense, you’ll get out of town as soon as possible. Yewbrooke isn’t a place for outsiders and I don’t know how much longer they’ll tolerate you.”

“We can’t just-”

Yuri put a hand on her shoulder to quiet her. He had pretty strong feelings about the sacrifice, too, but Gideon wasn’t the one to argue with. They’d come here to find out the truth about the town, and he’d told them. They owed it to him to let him sleep off the rest of his hangover in peace. “Thanks for telling us what’s going on. We’ll leave you alone now.”

“Hope you’re satisfied and don’t need to come banging later on.”

“No, you’ve told us everything we needed. Thanks.”

Yuri tugged on Estelle’s elbow because she looked like she still had things to say. They left the house and walked far enough away along the edge of the forest to talk without being overheard.

“I can’t believe this!” Estelle blurted while Yuri thoughtfully watched the woods, unwilling to turn his back to them. “They sacrifice someone every year! It’s so horrible! All the poor people who pull that rotten coin out of the bun…. All of them spent a whole year thinking it was right for them to be sacrificed, and that’s a horrible way for anyone to feel. No one should have to think that the world would be better off with them dead! I can’t stand to think that Christabel is gearing herself up to be killed and that she thinks she has to die. Yuri, we can’t just walk away from this town and let them keep victimizing innocent people like this.” She took a few deep breaths after her outburst and then noticed Yuri wasn’t fully paying attention to her. “Yuri?”

Because Yuri was staring fixedly at something in the trees. In the distance, just at the edge of where individual tree trunks blurred into shadows, there was a shadow just a bit darker than the others. It might be a large animal, if that long and thin section was a leg that reached up to a body shrouded by leaves, and - there, that flutter, that could either have been a squirrel moving along a branch or the side of something much larger shifting behind the leaves. Was he imagining the shade passed on that rock being thicker and darker with the pattern of trees, or was it being cast by a thicker branch he couldn’t see? His heart seemed convinced that something was there if the throbbing was anything to go off of. The sense of being a petrified deer just fifty feet from a predator suggested that as well.

Yuri struggled to breathe. The fear had rushed over him with no warning and his vision blurred, making the thing in the distance even harder to make out. He shouldn’t have brought Estelle to this village. He shouldn’t have brought her to this house right at the edge of the woods. His best friend was about to die and it was all his damn fault.

“Do you see something, Yuri?”

Yuri whipped his head around to check on Estelle. “There - in the woods just ahead -” Yuri blinked a few times and pointed ahead.

“Um… what am I looking for?”

“It’s….” Yuri’s brow creased. Which shadow had freaked him out again? None of them stood out as unusual now. His vision flitted over the tall, thin shapes of tree trunks and tried to pinpoint the one that wasn’t a tree trunk. “Huh.”

“What was it?”

“I - I thought I saw something lurking out there.”

“Lurking?” Estelle shivered slightly even though the air was warm enough that the back of Yuri’s neck was damp. ‘Lurking’ was not a good verb.

There was nothing in the forest. No matter how hard Yuri stared, he couldn’t find the exact pattern of shapes and shadows that had freaked him out so badly. The heart-thudding fear hadn’t subsided yet and he had a new appreciation for something Karol had once said: the only thing scarier than seeing a spider in your room was coming back with a shoe and not seeing a spider.

But he still felt the panic rising. Like a thick slime, it oozed up his chest and squeezed his heart and lungs. He couldn’t see it, but it was still there and it was going to burst out of the trees any second now. His left hand clenched and unclenched as if a sword would magically appear in it. He was unarmed, and he was about to be attacked. Even worse, Estelle was about to be attacked. He couldn’t protect her and both of them were going to die and the certainty of that made his knees weak and his breath come in taut gasps.

Estelle gently took Yuri’s hand. “Let’s go back to the great house.”

Yuri let her pull him away from the woods and back toward the main road. It was good that she led the way because Yuri’s mind was racing in circles so fast he couldn’t focus on vision and the world came to him in a series of blurry images. The weight of danger and fear crushed his lungs. His only anchor to reality was Estelle’s hand and with panic gripping him so tightly, he couldn’t even spare a moment to feel embarrassed if villagers saw him being led like this.

The next time Yuri became concretely aware of his surroundings, it was when Estelle let go of his hand to shut the door of their bedroom. In their room, he had enough presence of mind to sit on the edge of his bed, whereupon he leaned forward with his arms folded over his stomach and took deep breaths. Repede’s head landed on his knee and offered a reassuring presence as he tried to get his mind in order again.

You’re not going to die, you’re not going to die, he screamed at himself and, slowly, he began to believe it. Yuri reached out to Repede’s head and curled his fingers through sun-warmed fur. After sitting like that for a minute or two, he managed to get a handle on his breathing again and finally raised his head to see Estelle watching him nervously.

“Um… are you feeling better?” She sat on her bed with her legs folded and hands in her lap.

Yuri looked away and muttered, “Yeah.” One hand still absently stroked Repede’s neck as he took slow, steady breaths and felt his heartbeat gradually return to a normal rate. He felt like he’d run a mile. “Sorry.”

“You have nothing to apologize for!”

But he did. Now that his mind was once again capable of putting together rational thoughts, he was able to feel shame and frustration at losing it in front of Estelle. He was supposed to look out for her. She was Estelle, the girl he’d whisked away from the palace not even a year ago. He’d made it his duty to be someone she could lean on, and now he was leaning on her.

“Yuri… on our way into the forest, this happened, too. You said you didn’t want to talk about it, but… but I think we need to talk about it.”

Yuri scowled and kept his attention on Repede, not sure what to say.

“It’s just, it’s happened twice now. And you said you woke up from a nightmare this morning, too. It’s really clear to me that you’re not ok, not really, and I think we need to talk about it. If you won’t do it for yourself, then maybe because it might interfere with our mission here.”

Yuri’s hand paused on Repede’s head. Face tight, he said, “I don’t want you to worry about me.”

Estelle’s fingers curled around her skirt. “It’s too late for that. Please, Yuri, you always help me work through whatever I’m struggling with; let me help you, too.”

Yuri let out another long breath. She was right and he knew it. “Alright…. Alright, we can talk.”

Estelle’s fretful expression relaxed into a relieved smile. “Thank you.”

“Where do we even start?”

“I think… start with today. What happened? What set off this, um, episode? I just want to know if there’s anything I can do to keep this from happening in the future.”

Yuri finally released Repede and leaned back on his hands. “Today, huh? Alright, well, this probably sounds crazy but I thought I saw some… thing. It’s been bothering me since we arrived, really. I can’t shake the feeling that we’re being watched all the time, like there’s something in the woods that’s looming over us. I thought I saw something out in the trees just outside Gideon’s place, and as I tried to make it out, this awful panic came over me. I think I’m going crazy.”

Estelle nodded slowly as he spoke. “I know what you mean. I want to tell you that it was all in your head, but… I didn’t tell you this morning because I didn’t want you to worry, but now I don’t want you to think you’re crazy. I saw something last night, too. I don’t know what, but it followed me to Christabel’s house. There really is something in those woods, Yuri - it’s not just in your head.”

That didn’t reassure him as much as she seemed to hope it would, because now he had to worry about Estelle being in danger from this thing, too. “But some of it is. I just don’t know how much. This didn’t just start when we got to Yewbrooke. It’s been worse since we got to this creepy town, yeah, but I’ve felt like I’m on the verge of breaking down ever since we got back to Zaphias.”

“Is it just stress, do you think? I know we’ve talked before about how weird it is to try to fit into everyday lives now after all the adventure earlier this year.”

Yuri leaned back further to gaze up at the ceiling beams. “Partly. You know… I’ve never wanted responsibility. That was Flynn’s thing. I’d rather do my own thing and not have other people relying on me.” He frowned and shook his head. “But then this big adventure happened, and before I knew it, I had you, and Karol, and Rita, and every decision I made about where to go or how to approach an enemy might mean not just my death but yours, too.”

“But we all worked together to decide what to do.”

“I know, but in the early days, before Judy and Raven joined us, it felt like, well, you three were just kids.” Yuri glanced at Estelle sitting across from him, thoughtful and considerate, and wondered at how much growing up she’d done since they met. Then he wondered if Hanks thought the same thing when looking at him. “I was the adult. If anything happened to Karol, it would have been on me. Even after the others joined us, I still felt like everyone tended to look to me for decisions. Plus, the longer we spent together the more I cared about all of you.” His fingers curled into the bedspread. “I’m not Flynn. I never asked for that much responsibility. Every day, I worried about what we were doing and what would happen if I did something wrong and all of you died. It’s like… you know that time Ba’ul flew through a windstorm?”

Estelle shuddered. “The Fiertia swayed so much I thought the ropes would snap and we’d all plummet to the ocean.”

“Yeah. It lasted over an hour. All that up and down and side to side movement. I don’t know about you, but after we finally hit smooth skies, I was lying in my bunk and I still felt the movement. Even though I was lying completely still, my body still felt phantom turbulence.”

“Oh, yes! I felt that too! It was weird.”

“So, I think that’s what I’m feeling right now. For our entire journey, I was stressed constantly. There was always something hugely important to be working toward, always danger to keep alert for, and always some major concern to be thinking over. The journey’s over and we’ve hit clear skies, but my mind won’t switch off the stress mode. It’s like I’ve been ready for a monster ambush at every minute of the day since we got back.”

“That sounds exhausting.”

“Tell me about it.” It was amazing how much energy panicking could take up just by being there in the background. “Getting rid of the Adephagos is what really did it, I think. I was already stressed about you guys, but then the Adephagos made me start worrying about every damn person on the planet.”

“Are you upset because you think we chose wrong?”

Yuri heard the worry in her voice. The idea that they’d made the wrong decision in getting rid of blastia bothered Estelle as much as Yuri’s issues bothered him. “No,” he said with as much confidence as he could to pacify her. “I still think we did the only thing we could. But I also keep having nightmares about what could have happened if it didn’t work and the whole world was slowly killed because I tried the wrong thing.”

“Ok.” She nodded slowly. “But you know, Yuri, big decisions are not just up to you, you know? Coming here was my decision. I made this choice myself, so if I had gotten hurt on the way here, that wouldn’t be on you.”

“I know. To live is to choose, you said. I want you to make your own decisions. But also… I can’t stop myself from feeling responsible.” He closed his eyes in frustration for a second. “If I could logic away feeling like this by reminding myself that I’m not responsible for you, I wouldn’t be in this mess.”

“Heh. I guess that’s true. Maybe if you remind yourself over and over, though, eventually it will stick. I know you were the one to wield Brave Vesperia Number Two when we took care of the Adephagos, but all of us decided to do it. You don’t have to carry this burden alone. When you feel the anxiety building up again, um, try to remind yourself of that, maybe?”

“Yeah. I’ll try that.”

“And what should I do? How can I help you when an attack builds up again?”

Yuri thought for a while and then half-heartedly shrugged. “Basically what you did today. If you could just make sure I get somewhere private to cool off on my own, I’d appreciate that.”

She bobbed her head once, firmly. “Ok. I’ll do that. Thank you for talking with me.”

“I should probably be thanking you.”

“But now… you know who else I really want to talk to?”

“Christabel. I want to talk to her, too.”

Estelle clasped her hands together. “To think that she’s convinced she has to sacrifice herself. It’s awful.”

“Do you think it can wait a bit? I’d like to talk with her, too, but I don’t feel up to it just yet.”

“Of course.”


	7. The End of the Path

Yuri felt stupid spending the rest of the morning inside. It was a beautiful day and the hill by the river was full of laughing children and sunbathing locals, but he spent the rest of the morning in their room at the great house with his back to the balcony door.

He was stressed - so stressed it caused a physical ache in his chest. His mind screamed at him to go, but he had nowhere to actually go. He hadn’t been able to relax since he’d not seen something in the woods by Gideon’s house and the thought of some hideous evil lunging out of the forest to kill them all wouldn’t leave him alone. He laid on the bed with his face pressed into a pillow and tried to stop being anxious over absolutely nothing.

The door open and he flinched. Rolling over, he saw Estelle standing in the doorway. “Sorry to startle you. They’re serving lunch in the dining room, if you’re interested.”

Yuri was halfway through opening his mouth to say she hadn’t startled him, but then figured there was no point. He sat up and pushed his hair away from his face, rubbing away sweat from the sun blazing through the window. Did he feel like going down and joining a big group meal? Absolutely not, but he also didn’t like the idea of spending the entire day curled up in bed because of one weird shadow. “Alright, I’ll come down.”

“I can bring food up for you if you’re hungry.”

“No, it’s fine.” He swung his legs off the bed and stretched. “How was your morning? Did you see Christabel?”

“I didn’t. She was in the dining hall with the mayor and a bunch of other people all morning.”

Yuri stood up and paused. “What other people?”

“I’m not sure, but some of the people we’ve seen around, like Mr. Cranmer from last night, and the man who runs the tavern, and… I think the woman I saw is the midwife, and some others I don’t know. About a dozen in all.”

Yuri frowned as he crossed the room. “Do you know what they were talking about?”

“No. The door was shut, and you can’t make out any words through the windows, at least not from far enough away to not be seen spying.”

Yuri had to smile at the little adventure her words implied she’d had. “It’s such a hot day, though. I wouldn’t want to sit in an enclosed room with no windows or doors open.”

“I know, that’s why I thought it was weird enough to try listening in. Um, you don’t think that was bad, do you? Eavesdropping, I mean?”

Yuri thought about some of the crimes he’d committed. “I don’t see anything wrong with it at all. Too bad you didn’t learn anything.”

The dining room door was open when they arrived, and a small feast of bread, cheese, meats, and vegetables lay across the table. Yuri tried not to think about the price this town paid for such abundance of food. The sort of meal would be reserved for only the most significant festival of the year in the lower quarter, not a mundane lunch. He slowly sat and picked up a piece of cheese. Someone had died for this. Last year’s prince or princess had been torn apart by whatever screwed up monster lived in the woods to bring him this cheese.

“How was your meeting with the charcoal burner?”

Yuri had barely noticed Mayor Gower was in the room as well. He sat at the head of the table, a few seats away from Yuri and Estelle. Christabel sat across from them, and the servants Yuri had seen around since the first day were quietly eating as well.

“Fine.” Yuri shrugged and grabbed a pickle.

“Did you receive the information you were seeking?”

Yuri glanced at Estelle. What would the townsfolk do if they found out he and Estelle knew the truth? Better not press their luck. “Not as much as we hoped.”

“I see.” Gower watched his plate as he cut into a piece of chicken. “How much longer do you believe you will be staying with us?”

Christabel shot a glance at Gower before turning back to her food. Her expression was tense, and once again Yuri wondered what they’d been discussing in here all morning.

“We aren’t sure,” Estelle said. “We still haven’t found what we’re looking for to help our people.”

“I’ve told you,” Gower said while looking up sharply. “The only method we have to defend ourselves from monsters is the Crukh. He will not help you outside of this forest. There is nothing for you here.”

“We’d like to stay just a little bit longer to make sure,” Estelle said with a sweet smile. “I would just feel awful if I went home and didn’t explore every possible option.”

It was good that Estelle had explained, because Gower was more accommodating to Estelle’s politeness than he would have been to whatever defiant stubbornness Yuri would have come up with. “That’s… understandable, yes. You will not find anything that will help you, but I understand the need to take a few more days to make sure you feel no need to come back.”

While Estelle thanked him for the understanding, Yuri watched the table. Who was annoyed that they were staying? Gower, and one of the servants. Why? They didn’t like outsiders in the village, maybe. It was clear that Yewbrooke was unfamiliar with visitors, but was that the only reason?

Who was glad? Christabel, and the other two servants. Now, why was that? Christabel was probably glad they were staying because, if Estelle was right, she had a crush on Yuri. What about the others? Why would a few servants to whom Yuri had barely spoken be glad that they were staying? And what was with that look Gower gave Christabel right at the end, as if he was admonishing her for something? Yuri really wished the windows had been cracked open for Estelle to eavesdrop this afternoon.

Christabel finished eating first and excused herself to her room. Yuri watched her go, and then nudged Estelle. A minute later, they thanked their hosts for the food and left as well. They went upstairs, but instead of turning to their own room, they made their way to the door at the opposite end of the hall and knocked. Christabel opened it and looked to them with surprise. “Oh, hello. Can I help you?”

“Hi,” Estelle said sweetly. “We were wondering if we could talk to you? Only if you’re not busy, of course.”

“Oh, yes, of course.” She pushed her door wider and then turned back to her room and ran to her bed. She quickly pulled the old green blanket up and straightened the pillows. “I’m sorry about the mess.”

“It’s fine,” Estelle said. “Yuri keeps his room much messier than this.”

Yuri looked over from the bars on the window he’d been inspecting and scowled. “Hey.”

“You can sit here.” Christabel pulled a chair away from her desk and pushed it toward Yuri. She sat on her bed, cross-legged, but kept glancing around to a dress draped over a chair or the pile of books left on the desk. “What did you want to talk about?”

Estelle took a seat on the edge of the bed next to Christabel. “It’s about… well, the Crukh.”

“What about him?”

“It’s…” Estelle glanced at closed door. “We talked to Gideon today, and he told us what the Crukh does to the princess every year.”

Christabel’s face froze.

“And I wanted to talk you about it,” Estelle hurried on, “because not too long ago, I also thought I needed to die for the good of everyone else, and I know how horrible that feels.”

Christabel’s words faltered. She had a few false starts before she said, “I don’t… feel horrible.”

“Phaeroh - he’s an Entelexeia - told me that the power I have is a poison to the world, and I had to die so that others could live. I didn’t want to die, not at all, and I wanted to find another way to save the world, but I thought that if there was no other way, then that’s ok. But, it’s not. Yuri helped me realize that it isn’t ok to be ok with dying.”

Christabel looked to Yuri, back to Estelle, and then at her knees. “It’s… it’s not that I’m ok with it.” And then, almost a whisper, she said, “I don’t want to die.”

“Are you being held captive?” Yuri leaned forward. “Can’t help but notice the bars on your window.”

She shook her head. “No…. I mean, yes, there have always been bars on the windows of this room, because princes and princesses in the past have tried to flee, but I don’t plan to do that.”

“If it’s because you don’t think there’s a way out, then we can help. Estelle and I have some experience breaking out of places. We can help you run away.” And then what would she do? Yuri didn’t know, but he couldn’t sit back and not help when her life was in danger.

“No.” She shook her head with more confidence this time. “I can’t leave. The Crukh needs his sacrifice, or the whole town will be destroyed. If I run, everyone here will suffer.”

“They seem to be ok with making you suffer,” Yuri pointed out.

“That’s just how it is. Someone has to die every year so that the rest of us can live in peace. I don’t want to die, but someone has to.”

“You don’t know that for sure,” Estelle said. “There’s no proof that the Crukh really has the power to destroy the village, or the desire, or even that he’s the one who originally demanded the sacrifice. Everyone just assumes that you have to sacrifice someone, because it’s what you’ve always done, but you don’t know that for sure!”

Christabel started shaking her head before Estelle even finished talking. “Even though we don’t know with absolute certainty, the alternative is too horrible to risk.”

“Why don’t we just tell everyone to leave with us?” Yuri suggested. “Tell them you won’t be sacrificing yourself, and to come with us if they don’t want to risk facing the Crukh’s temper tantrum. If they choose to stay, they know what they’re getting into.”

“No. Even if they chose to stay, their deaths would still be my fault. Besides, it’s not that easy to pick up your life and your whole family and move with a couple of days’ notice. Don’t think that I don’t understand what I’m agreeing to.” Her brow creased and she considered her words before delivering them. “My mother was the princess when I was seven. I… heard the screams. I know what it means to give yourself to the Crukh, but someone has to, or else everyone in the village will suffer like that.”

Yuri met her eyes for a long moment and saw her determination. He nodded slowly. “Alright.”

Estelle shot her head to him. “But-!”

Yuri held up a hand. “But before you resign yourself to death, what if we killed the Crukh?”

Christabel stared at him. “Kill the Crukh? That can’t be done.”

Estelle had been staring at Yuri with wide-eyed understanding and then said, “Well, why not? If it exists physically to harm people, that means people can harm it, too.”

“Exactly,” Yuri said. “And it isn’t like we haven’t fought monsters before.”

Christabel frowned while shaking her head. “The Crukh is not just a monster. He is the god of our woods. He can’t be killed by a mere human with a sword.”

“Let Yuri and I try to kill the Crukh,” Estelle said. “We’ve fought many powerful monsters before. If the Crukh is dead, no one needs to be sacrificed to him.”

Her frown deepened. “If he’s dead, the village will no longer be protected.”

“Then build walls,” Yuri said. “Like everyone else in the world does. Build walls to keep out the monsters, and don’t kill anyone.”

Christabel took a breath and bit her lip. “I think… you should try.”

Estelle beamed. “And when we get rid of the Crukh, no one in Yewbrooke will ever have to be sacrificed again.”

“Ok. When’s the sacrifice supposed to be?” Yuri asked.

“In three days, on midsummer’s eve.”

“Got it.” Yuri gazed into the woods beyond the barred windows. “Ok… there isn’t time to go back to Zaphias and get our friends to help. I think Estelle, Repede and I can handle it, though.” Besides, it was bad enough if this plan put Estelle in danger. Could he justify dragging Karol, Rita, Judith, and Raven into danger as well? If he said he needed help with a big monster, they would agree in an instant - Judith would probably be happy for the challenge - but if they got hurt in the fight, that would be on him. It was a miracle none of them had died fighting any of the gigantos, Alexei, Duke… that luck couldn’t last forever. A horrible injury - maybe a fatal one - had to be right around the corner and the thought of putting more of his friends into danger rekindled all the panicky feelings he’d dealt with this morning. “Actually… maybe Estelle should stay behind.”

“Yuri,” she said firmly. “I want to help. I’m choosing to go. You can’t stop me.”

Yuri met her gaze and tried to remember what he’d told him. It wasn’t just him making decisions. This wasn’t his responsibility. Good or bad, this was her choice. It helped, a little.

Christabel watched the note of tension with a hint of confusion and then said, “So… you’re both going to go and try to destroy the Crukh?”

Yuri nodded and looked away from Estelle. “That’s right. We’ll go tomorrow morning.”

“You’ll have to cross the river to get to the Crukh,” Christabel said. “You’ll be in trouble if you’re seen, so go at the crack of dawn and cross the river at the edge of town.”

“We can do that,” Estelle said.

“And….” She licked her lips nervously. “Please promise me that if it looks like the Crukh is too powerful, or that he’s going to kill you, please run away. If you can’t destroy him, just come back to the village alive. I won’t blame you for not saving me.”

“Agreed,” Yuri said. “I don’t feel like dying yet.”

Christabel smiled nervously. “Good luck.”

* * *

Yuri and Estelle went to bed early that night to make sure they were well-rested for this mission the next day. With the summer solstice only days away, that meant it was only barely dusk by the time they crawled under the sheets. It was maybe odd, but Yuri felt more relaxed tonight than he had in ages. His mind had been so stressed over what big, life-or-death mission he had to take care of and freaking out when he didn’t have one. The prospect of going into battle against a dangerous foe tomorrow felt comfortable and familiar.

“Yuri….” Estelle’s voice broke through the dim room. “You’re not asleep yet, are you?”

“No. What’s on your mind?” Because she was on his. It may have eased his anxiety to actually have an important mission to take care of again, but the fear of taking Estelle into danger still preyed at him.

“I want to try to get rid of the Crukh because I hate that Christabel is going to sacrifice herself and I hate that anyone in this town has to be sacrificed. But, I’m also wondering, is it really our place to kill their god?”

“Some god. No god worth worshipping only helps his follows in return for blood.”

“I know. I think so, too, but he’s still their god.” Blankets rustled as she rolled onto her side. “I keep thinking about something Duke said when we were planning to get rid of the blastia, about how it was a decision that would affect so many people and do we really have the right to make it for everyone.”

Yuri folded his hands under his head. “I considered that a lot, actually, and I think the answer is the same here. If we didn’t get rid of blastia, everyone would die. If we don’t get rid of the Crukh, people will die. Anyone should have the right to prevent people from dying.”

“How many people will die in Yewbrooke after the Crukh stops keeping monsters away?”

“They can build a wall. It works in Aurnion.”

“They thought it worked in Midbell, too. Plus, I keep thinking about how relaxed Mr. Cranmer was when his wife went into labour. Nobody dies of childbirth or sicknesses here either.”

Her words hung in the following silence. If they didn’t kill the Crukh, people would die. If they did kill the Crukh, people would die. “Let’s….” Then he had to falter out again because he still didn’t know what he wanted to do. The weight of the decision pressed on his chest and made it hard to breathe. Yuri sucked in a breath and tried to think clearly. “Let’s follow the trail tomorrow and see what we find. We can make a decision after we figure out what the Crukh even is. Maybe the Crukh isn’t what’s keeping monsters out at all. Maybe it’s just some opportunist evil taking advantage of a town with natural defences.”

“I really hope that’s the case.”

“There’s something else I’ve been thinking about, too.”

“What’s that?” Estelle asked.

Yuri concentrated on the woodgrain of the ceiling beams as he considered this. Part of him didn’t want to worry Estelle, but he knew she’d be upset with him if he didn’t share his thoughts. “It’s just… Christabel invited Flynn here to learn how to protect people without blastia. But everyone here keeps telling us the only answer is the Crukh, and the Crukh won’t help people outside of the forest. What did she think Flynn was going to find?”

Now it was Estelle’s turn to fall silent for a bit. “Do you not trust her?”

Yuri frowned. “I’m not sure. Maybe she was hoping we’d go after the Crukh all along. Makes sense, doesn’t it? Why not invite a blastia researcher? She could have addressed the letter to Flynn thinking some heroic knight would ride in and slay the monster to save her from death.”

“If that is the case, I can’t blame her.”

“Same here.” Yuri pulled his arms down and rolled over, back to the balcony as was becoming his habit. “I just wish she’d be upfront about it.”

* * *

They snuck away from Yewbrooke at dawn. Yuri led Estelle and Repede away from the village, down the path toward Gideon’s house. They planned to enter the woods here and cross the river a little further down. When they ducked under the perimeter ropes, Estelle paused and took a bit of paper in her hand.

“I forgot to ask Christabel about these. I figured out that all the writing on them are people’s names.”

“Names? Huh. Do you think they’re the names of people offered up to the Crukh in the past?”

“That was my theory. It would make sense - sort of, symbolically marking this space as protected by their sacrifice. I’ll ask Christabel when we get back.”

Then they moved on, and stepping beyond the ropes felt like jumping into icy water; his skin instantly crawled and a physical jolt sank into his chest.

“Remember the last time the three of us set off into a spooky forest?” Estelle asked, climbing over a mossy log. “Before we met Karol, even.”

“You were afraid of being turned into a frog.” Yuri held a prickly branch of pine needles away for her.

Estelle laughed. “It seems silly now. Although, being turned into a frog sounds nicer than whatever the Crukh allegedly does.”

They paused when they reached the river, but Repede barged ahead with a splash. Yuri quickly followed suit. “The water’s pretty warm.”

Estelle hiked her skirt up to her waist so only her leggings would get wet and waded after Yuri. The river wasn’t very deep; even in the middle, it only reached Yuri’s upper thighs. He thought about something he’d been told, that the river was created by the Crukh dragging a claw across the land. The river was only about fifteen feet from bank to bank, but the thought of a claw fifteen feet wide made him wonder at how big the monster attached to it was. But then, that was probably just a story.

On the opposite bank, Yuri held out a hand for Estelle and pulled her out of the mud. They could see the village just around the bend of the river, looking serene in the early grey light. Yuri shuddered to think what the price of their serenity was.

Estelle interrupted his thoughts to say, “Oh, Repede, can you not-”

Then Repede shook himself to splatter both Yuri and Estelle with droplets of water and the scent of wet dog.

Yuri gave him a look. “Thanks, buddy.”

Repede gave a woof and set off into the woods.

It only took a few minutes to cut through the trees and arrive at the trail leading away from the village. They paused when they found it and Yuri spotted the fading tracks of the rappig from a few nights earlier.

“Are you sure about this? It’s not too late to go back to Yewbrooke.”

“I’m sure.” She smiled tightly. “You don’t have to protect me, Yuri. We’re going to face a monster, and we’re going to protect each other.”

Yuri nodded at her resolve. “Right.”

Repede took off down the path, followed by Yuri and Estelle. Repede had an easier time of it due to the overhanging branches. It made sense, because this path was made by animals, but the feeling Yuri got as he pushed pine needles out of his face was, humans don’t belong here. Yuri wondered if it was his imagination that this side of the river was quieter, like all the birds were holding their breath. The path gradually veered to the left, so eventually, Yuri looked back and realized the village was no longer in sight. Behind them were nothing but trees standing like silent sentinels. Yuri looked away and resumed walking; looking back just made him feel edgy.

The heat didn’t help. Even this early in the morning, the sun was gearing up for another hot day and stuffy humidity hung between the trees. It made the air thick and suffocating, or at least Yuri blamed his difficulty breathing on that. He rested a hand on a skinny tree as he climbed over a knee-high rock, and as he did, his eyes skirted over the woods to his left. A shadow moved behind a tree and Yuri’s breath caught in his throat. Frozen, eyes fixed on the trees, he willed whatever it had been to move again and prove it had been only a deer.

“What is it?” Estelle asked.

Yuri flinched at her words, which sounded far too loud in the quiet forest even though they’d been barely over a whisper. “Nothing.”

“Yuri.”

He bit his lip. “Thought I saw something. Doesn’t look like anything is there.” Yuri checked on Repede, and wasn’t reassured by his alert ears or the tail held close to his legs, moving in tight wags. Repede wasn’t growling in the direction Yuri thought he’d seen something, though. The dog’s ears swivelled around, expecting an attack from any direction. He whined when Yuri and Estelle stopped, clearly keen to keep moving.

“Let’s move on,” Yuri muttered in a low voice, not daring to speak too loudly in case it attracted… something.

They pushed on through the trees, ducking under branches and struggling through overgrown bushes. At times Yuri thought they’d lost the path entirely, and only Repede sniffing the ground and leading the way brought them back to the faint trail. It seemed like the forest stretched on forever, until suddenly the trail let out in a shaded clearing and it seemed like they’d only been walking for about ten minutes.

In the forest of skinny, swaying trees with peeling bark and gnarled twigs, the broad trunk ahead of them looked alien. It was bigger around than Yuri could wrap his arms, and the roots stretched away from it like a tangled web. At its base, between two thick arms of roots, the ground opened into a black hollow. It was only about two feet wide, and there wasn’t nearly enough light to see how deep it went into the ground beneath the tree, and Yuri was inexplicably glad for that.

“That’s it,” Estelle said, standing so close their arms pressed together. Despite the heat, the contact was appreciated.

“I thought it would be bigger.”

Repede sat on Yuri’s other side, tail twitching, vibrating with a low growl.

“Maybe it can change size,” Estelle suggested.

Hot breath tickled the back of Yuri’s neck and he jerked around. Hand on his sword, he stared into empty trees.

Rather than asking what he’d seen, Estelle just whispered, “I feel it, too.”

Repede whined and Yuri absently rubbed his head. They shouldn’t be here. He shouldn’t have brought Estelle and Repede here. The heat pressing in around them - the suffocating pressure that was probably more than just heat - pushed them to leave. Yuri had thought they were lucky to not encounter regular monsters on their walk here, but now thought how foolish it was to barge into a place even monsters avoided. The presence that emanated from the dark hole in the roots made the message clear: they shouldn’t be here.

“Something has to be down there,” Yuri said, fighting through the dread that floated tangibly around the grove. “I don’t think it’s a hungry monster.” The Crukh couldn’t be down there when it was already lurking in the woods all around them, watching, waiting. “But if there is something in the woods that wards monsters away from the village, I think it’s gotta be down there. I’m going in.”

Estelle gripped his hand. “I’m going with you.”

“No.”

She squeezed tighter. “I’ve told you, Yuri. You have to stop trying to protect me all the time.”

“I know.” He pulled his hand away from her to rest on her shoulder and meet her eyes. “But honestly, this time it’s because I’m not crawling down there unless I know someone’s watching the entrance behind me.”

Her expression softened. “Ok. I can do that.”

Yuri lowered his arm but didn’t make any movement toward the hollow. Maybe if he put it off long enough, he wouldn’t have to.

Estelle said, “Do you think I should be the one to go in? If it narrows, I’m smaller.”

Yuri shook his head with a grim smile. “Nah. Barging into danger is kind of my thing.” The false confidence was still close enough to the real thing to let him approach the tree. Repede whined and hurried after, running in front to face Yuri and growl.

Yuri paused and rubbed the side of Repede’s neck. The sensation that this was a bad place to be and the desire to run away was strong enough in Yuri’s own mind, and he didn’t even have an animal’s instincts. “I’m just going down to check it out, ok?” Yuri kept one eye on the dark hole below the tree as he soothed Repede, just in case. In case of what, he wasn’t sure.

Repede whined and gave Yuri a piteous look. It killed Yuri to see his friend so nervous and knew that loyalty was the only thing keeping Repede from running back to the village.

“Stay here and help Estelle. I’ll be back in a minute.”

Repede whined at him as he move past the dog and finally stood before the hole. Yuri rested a hand on his hip as he decided his approach. He didn’t like the idea of sticking his legs in there blind, but going in headfirst was even less appealing. “I’m only going to pop in and see what’s down there,” Yuri said.

Estelle, clutching her sword as she stood near the opening, murmured, “Be safe.”

Yuri lowered himself to the ground and eased his feet into the hole. It would be fine, he told himself as he pushed to slid in. He’d fought dozens of monsters, and nothing small enough to fit in this hole could best him. Hadn’t he gone head to head with a raging giganto just a few months ago? There was no reason for him to feel like he was crawling into hell.

The passage was soft and earthy. It was just wide enough for him to slip his hips through, and he tried to stop imagining something grabbing his ankle and dragging him in further. As his shoulders entered, he tilted his head back to see Estelle, hovering over him with a stricken face. He forced a grin and scrabbled his feet to continue crawling down. Hair-thin roots, thickened by clumps of soil, tickled his face from the tunnel ceiling so close overhead. He was moving down at about a forty-five degree angle, earth walls threatening to squeeze him with every inch down. He couldn’t help but consider that there could be no quick exit from this hole.

He came out in a wide chamber, big enough to reach his arms out and not feel a wall, but with a low enough ceiling that he had to crouch. The silence rang in his ears and every breath brought in hot, stuffy air that smelled of something rotten. As he moved away from the small opening, light was able to make it down the hole just enough to highlight a pile of rubble in front of him. Yuri carefully drew his sword, though he wasn’t sure how well he could fight while hunched over on his knees.

He moved forward, right hand clawing at the air because there wasn’t enough light. It landed on a rock at the edge of the pile that was smooth and round. Yuri’s fingers trailed down the side and his heart lurched when he felt eye sockets.

A vision of skeletons scattered across city streets filled his mind.

You almost did this.

How sure had he been that their plan would work? They’d staked the lives of millions of people on it. The sword he’d pierced the sky with had been heavy from the weight of all the lives riding on them. They could have so easily failed, and the streets of Zaphias would run with the blood of his friends.

Yuri struggled to breathe and it wasn’t just because of the rancid air. He jerked his hand away from the skull and pressed his chest, willing it to stop tightening.

And now you brought Estelle into danger again.

Estelle screamed and fell to the forest floor, splattered in her own blood - except she didn’t. Yuri couldn’t hear Estelle at all, couldn’t hear anything from the world above in these depths, but the scene of Estelle’s bloody end played over and over in his head in such vibrant detail that it might as well be happening in front of him. He swore he could smell the blood. Estelle was going to die and it was all his fault for bringing her here. Murderer, his own voice whispered through his thoughts. You almost killed millions. Every life in the world hung in the balance and you thought you were worthy of taking that task on. 

But it hadn’t happened, Yuri thought furiously as he peered around the cavern. They’d confronted the Adephagos and won.

It was so close to happening, though. Millions of innocent lives all depended on you. 

Yuri squeezed his eyes shut and tried to replay the conversation with Estelle from yesterday. They had all made decisions as a team. It wasn’t just Yuri deciding things. There was no reason for him to be struggling to breathe as his heart raced a mile a minute.

One wrong move from you, and the world would die. The intrusive thoughts shouted over his memories of Estelle. How sure were you that it would work? How many options did you explore before diving into that one? Did the people whose lives depended on you know how uncertain you were?!

Yuri didn’t notice dropping the sword, but he was clutching his head and heaving for air. He hissed, “What are you?”

You’re a murderer. 

Yuri pressed his fingers over his ears and squeezed until it hurt, but the whispering voice wasn’t using his ears to get into his brain.

You thought you had the right to kill Ragou. You believed you had the right to decide if Cumore lived or died. And then you imposed your will on the whole world, risked all their lives, thought you alone had the right to determine the course of history.

With eyes adjusting to the dark, the pile of bones before him became clearer. The skull he’d touched was the first of many that mingled within thigh bones and rib cages. They were all human, but they were also overlayed with the vision of thousands of corpses strewn before him, victims of the Adephagos that he had failed to save.

But he had saved them, Yuri tried to argue. He tried to shout into the dark that he had won and any doubts were in the past, but his mouth was too preoccupied with sucking in air as fast as possible.

You’re a monster, his thoughts said. You spread nothing but death. The world would be better off if-

Something warm slithered around his waist and Yuri jerked away with a gasp.

“Yuri!” The familiar voice seemed to come from the end of a long tunnel, but Estelle was right in front of him, grabbing him. “Yuri, come on, let’s get out of here.”

Yuri, shaking, let Estelle drag him back to the tunnel. He only just had the presence of mind to snatch his sword from the ground. Estelle pushed him headfirst toward the tunnel.

“Go! Climb!”

His limbs felt like jelly as he began to crawl. Estelle pushed his legs, urging him to move faster. Dirt ran down the collar of his shirt as she squeezed back up. Why even bother? They were not alone in the cavern and he didn’t think that whatever had joined him down there wanted him to leave. It tugged at his mind, along with a hundred images of Estelle trapped alone in the cavern where he’d left her. She was going to die down there all because he’d run away first. Yuri wasn’t sure if his chest ached more from self-loathing or terror.

Sunlight hit his face, blinding. Yuri struggled out of the hole and rolled away, panting. Repede barked and ran to him, and Yuri used him as support to get into a kneeling position. “Estelle,” he croaked.

Seconds later, Estelle emerged from the hole, her face streaked with dirt and tears. She gasped for air like she was surfacing from water threw herself at Yuri with a sob.

Yuri clutched her, relishing how alive she was. Her own thudding heartbeat combated the images of her corpse that kept trying to fill his brain. For over a minute, they clung to each other and tried to calm the other down. As they did, Yuri was dimly aware that something was watching them, but he didn’t have the wherewithal to look any closer at the time. When he had finally resumed control of his breathing and slowly parted from Estelle to check over his shoulder, it had moved on.

“Yuri,” Estelle whispered, rubbing tears from her eyes, “I don’t think… I don’t think we can kill the Crukh.”

Yuri eyed the hole and couldn’t stop a shiver despite the heat. “Not like this, anyway. Let’s get out of here.”

They staggered to their feet and brushed off the dirt. Yuri gave the hole one last look before striding away from the tree. Estelle and Repede hurried beside him. Even with the grove disappearing behind them, Yuri couldn’t shake a nagging tug trying to pull him back there. Whatever had been down in the dark, it knew him. His face was still pale and sweaty as his mind kept replaying the experience in excruciating detail. Even now, he wasn’t sure if it had been an outside presence whispering in his thoughts, or if the tense environment had triggered his own mind to turn on itself.

“Thanks for coming down,” Yuri said after they had walked in silence for over five minutes. “But why did you? I was only down there for a couple of minutes. Did something happen?”

Estelle glanced up at him, eyebrows knit. “Well, you were screaming.”

Now it was Yuri’s turn to look confused. “I was?”

“Yes,” she said hesitantly. “You were shouting for help.”

Yuri stared at the path ahead. “I don’t know if that was me.”

They walked in silence for a few more minutes. Then Estelle said, “What was that down there?”

Yuri shrugged. “I was expecting a monster, not… that. It didn’t hurt you, did it?”

“No…. It just, made me think about things….”

Yuri looked down at her haunted expression and suppressed the urge to ask what she’d heard. That would open the door to her asking him. “Manipulative bastard. Throwing shit at your brain so you’ll do yourself in without it needing to lift a finger.”

“I don’t know what we’re going to tell Christabel,” Estelle said, resolutely moving the conversation on. “We were supposed to defeat the Crukh so she wouldn’t have to die, but we failed. I don’t even know if it has a physical body we can hurt. Maybe the invisible presence in the cave is the Crukh, and everything else is just… aspects of it, like stems branching from a core.”

Yuri frowned. “We’ll think of something. We still have two days. Let’s get back, clear our heads, and figure it out.”

It was with great relief when they reached the river. Estelle didn’t even both trying to hike her skirt up this time and wearily splashed in. Yuri took a deep breath when he emerged on the other bank and even the air felt lighter here. “I want to go back to the great house and sleep for a week,” he said, stretching his back.

“Mm, me too.”

They cut through the trees and returned to the village. It was still early morning, but the village had woken up while they were gone. A few people stared out the windows at them as they walked by.

The stares increased until they arrived at the town square in front of the great house. As they approached, the front doors opened and Mayor Gower stepped out with Christabel lurking behind him. The door to the tavern behind them opened and patrons streamed out, followed by more villagers emerging from homes around the square. There were no weapons in the village, but it was amazing how threatening farming tools could look when held with the right amount of anger.

Repede growled and Yuri looked around at the unfriendly welcome party. “Something wrong?”

“You have broken our most sacred law,” Gower declared from the steps of the great house. “You were warned against crossing the river, but you persisted in doing so.”

“We didn’t,” Estelle protested. “Yuri and I just went to a walk and we waded in the river a bit because it was hot, but stayed by the bank on the village side.”

“Do not lie,” Gower said. “The princess has already informed us of your intentions. You trespassed on the Crukh’s territory, intending to do him harm.”

Furious mutterings followed his words and the pitchforks, butcher knives, and sickles glinted in the sun.

“Plus,” Gower went on and pointed to Estelle, “we’ve been told that you left the house at night and wandered the village, breaking yet another law.”

Estelle gaped at Christabel, who looked away.

“Put your weapons down,” Gower said. “And we will discuss what to do with you.”


	8. One Life Fore Another

The main hall of the great house had been converted into an audience chamber. Villagers packed in, with the front doors held open so those at the back could peer in from outside. Mayor Gower and Christabel stood on the grand staircase to speak over the audience. At the foot of the stairs, seated on cushioned seats but with their hands bound behind them, were Yuri and Estelle. Repede was locked in their room upstairs, but only after giving Yuri some furious snarls for grabbing and subduing him. Repede had wanted to fight, while Yuri understood that going up against a hundred armed and angry villagers was asking to be killed.

“Everyone, quiet down,” Gower said, holding out his hands. The angry crowd obeyed a lot faster than Zaphias citizens would have. “I do not believe we are in danger. If the Crukh planned to punish all of us for their intrusion, it would have happened already.”

“We don’t know that!” a woman yelled. “What if he stops protecting the crops!? What if illness comes to the village?!” A chorus of frightened agreements followed her words.

“That won’t happen,” Gower said firmly “The Crukh is not a fool. He knows they are not part of our village and do not know our laws.”

Christabel spoke up, looking out to the audience and refusing to turn her eyes on Yuri and Estelle. “But we are responsible for them.”

Gower folded his arms. “In what capacity?”

“They are foreigners to our village. We took them into the great house, fed them, gave them free run of the village. We knew that they didn’t understand our culture. If a child breaks a law, it is the parent’s responsibility for failing to teach them, or at least controlling them.”

Yuri wanted to argue that they were hardly children, but Christabel seemed to be arguing in their favour, so he held his tongue.

Someone in the audience wailed, “We’re all going to be punished!”

“No!” Christabel waved her hands to calm them down. “We are responsible for allowing these strangers to trespass in the Crukh’s home, but this situation can be salvaged. We must show the Crukh that we do not tolerate their crime, and that we intend to teach them to fear and obey him as we do.”

Yuri and Estelle shared a nervous glance. It wasn’t sounding like arguing in their favour anymore.

Christabel pointed to them, but her eyes never left the audience. “We must offer one of them to the Crukh during the midsummer festival. What better way to show him that we do not tolerate their crime than to force them to submit to the Crukh’s power?”

Gower became angry. “Christabel, we discussed this yesterday. We cannot offer people who are outsiders.”

“Why not?” she demanded. “Nowhere is it specified that the offering must reside here for a certain amount of time!”

Yuri couldn’t even feel surprised at Christabel’s suggestion. After everything that happened in the woods, he was too drained to feel shock. “We’re not playing along with your stupid ritual,” he declared. “Go ahead and kick us out of your village; it’s obvious there’s nothing for us here anyway.”

Gower turned back to them. “It’s too late for that. I told you to leave, and you didn’t listen. You never should have come in the first place. The only reason you’re here is because she,” and he spun to jab a finger at Christabel, “got cold feet about offering herself to the Crukh and tried to lure the commandant here to take her place!”

Estelle looked past him to Christabel. “That’s not true, is it?”

Christabel glanced their way, bit her lip, and turned back to the crowd.

Gower continued, “The Crukh chose you, Christabel. You can’t just invite a stranger here to take you place.”

She hesitated, but when she spoke, it was to the crowd more then Gower. “But I didn’t invite them. I invited Commandant Flynn. These two came on their own. Perhaps they were drawn to Yewbrooke for a reason.”

“Yeah, we were,” Yuri sneered. “The reason was you invited us.”

“Invited _Flynn_ ,” she countered without looking at him. “My friends, my neighbours, we have not had visitors to Yewbrooke in generations. That these two arrived so close to the offering cannot be coincidence. That, in addition to the need to prove to the Crukh that we do not condone their crime and wish the Crukh the chance to punish them is why I believe we should sacrifice one of them.”

“Have them choose a bun at the feast,” Gower said. “If they find the coin, then we will know that the Crukh wants them for the next year. But for this year, he chose you.”

“Let the village decide,” Christabel declared. “This decision affects all of us. We shall put it to a vote.”

The crowd cheered in agreement and Gower glared at Christabel’s confidence. They both knew how the vote would go over, Yuri thought. This wasn’t going to be a vote over the intricacies of traditional law and whether their ritual was allowed to use an outsider, it was a vote on whether the residents of town would rather kill off dear, beloved local princess Christabel or some stranger who marched in and annoyed people with questions.

The vote was held. Yuri didn’t know the exact number of people who voted for either him or Estelle to die, because that option had such an overwhelming majority that tallying the exact numbers wasn’t necessary.

“Very well.” Gower folded his arms and turned away from a beaming Christabel. “Which one, then? The girl’s the closest match to you.”

“No.” Yuri fixed his eyes on Gower with fury. “If you harm Estelle, your village really is stupid enough to deserve the inevitable payback. Estelle is a princess of the Empire; you really think you can make her disappear out in the woods without an entire army knocking on your doors a week from now?”

“Yuri, too!” Estelle gave him an angry look and scooted forward in her seat. “Yuri is best friends with the commandant. If he doesn’t come back, Commandant Flynn will come here looking!”

“That’s not important,” Yuri insisted. “Flynn won’t waste Imperial Knight resources for a personal friend who’s not even an Imperial citizen. If you went missing, though, it would be the biggest news in the Empire.”

“Oh, stop it, Yuri! The last time you went missing, Flynn sent out ships for weeks hoping to find you!”

“Enough!” Gower said over Yuri’s opening retort. “Christabel, hand me the coin. We will let it decide.”

She untied the string from her neck and let the old coin slip into her palm. When she approached Gower to hand it to him, she met Yuri’s eyes for the first time since the meeting had started. She showed a flicker of guilt and then quickly looked away.

Gower surveyed the pair while clutching the coin. “Alright… heads it’s the princess, tails it’s her friend.” He tossed it into the air.

Yuri fixed his gaze on the spinning disc, willing it to land on tails. Gower caught it, slapped it onto the back of his hand, and revealed fate’s decision.

“Tails it is.”

“No!” Estelle shouted as Yuri leaned back in his chair with relief. At least he could always rely on chance screwing him over.

Gower took the string from Christabel and retied the coin onto the necklace. Yuri glared up at him as Gower stood over him and slipped the necklace around his neck.

“Hail the Prince of Yewbrooke,” Gower announced.

The cheering crowd drowned out Estelle’s protests. Behind Gower, Christabel looked like she was about to cry, although Yuri’s sympathy for her had plummeted. Around his neck, the small coin felt impossibly heavy.

* * *

Yuri sat on the bed in Christabel’s room, although he supposed it was his room, now. She had moved her belongings out so that Yuri could enjoy the royal suite for his two days as prince, or at least so they had a room with barred windows and a door that locked from the outside to keep him in. Because they didn’t trust him, there were also guards outside the door. Still, in his many experiences of being locked up, he had to say that this cell was rather nice. Certainly the bed was more comfortable than anything provided in Zaphias’ jails. Of course, he’d never contemplated impending execution while sitting on the hard wooden benches below the castle.

What a mess he’d landed himself in. He still didn’t know what the Crukh was, but his experience in the woods had made him less eager than ever to meet it in person. On the plus side, he didn’t think a sword would be much use against it so maybe it wouldn’t matter if he faced it while unarmed and tied up. Strangely, contemplating the horrible fate that awaited him didn’t activate any anxiety. His mind had been running in circles trying to find something to stress over ever since their journey ended, but now that there was an actual horrible monster waiting to kill him, he could relax in the familiar territory.

Yuri bumped his head against the wall and let out a long, frustrated sigh. This was fine. He was imprisoned and set to be sacrificed to a horrible monster, but was this actually worse than facing the Adephagos? At least if he failed to figure a way out of this, only he would die and not thousands of others. He still had two days - more like a day and a half now - to figure a way out of this. He scanned the room, searching for ideas.

The windows were out of the question. That was one of the first things he’d checked, and confirmed that there was no way for him to pry the bars off or wiggle past them. Unless he lost a lot of weight really fast, he wasn’t sneaking out through a window. The walls, covered in nice wallpaper, were stone on the exterior, so smashing through them was hopeless. That left the door.

There were two guards outside, and they were armed. Yes, sure, they weren’t armed with technical weapons, but sharp edges were sharp edges whether they were originally designed to slice wheat or flesh. Still, those sharp edges were in the hands of people who had never experienced combat before. If he broke off a chair leg and took them by surprise, he could probably overpower them. Then he would have to find Estelle and Repede, because he knew that if he left Yewbrooke on his own, they’d just put Estelle on the chopping block in his place. So, he would have to find Estelle and Repede after knocking out both guards, then all three of them needed to get out of town without being seen….

Yuri closed his eyes and fought off the wave of tension clutching his chest. Now was not the time to let stress build up again.

The lock on his door clicked and Yuri bolted upright, instinctively reaching for a weapon. The door opened and Christabel appeared with a sandwich on a plate and Yuri lowered the pillow he’d grabbed. One of the guards closed the door behind her and she stood in the middle of the room. After staring at her for a prolonged moment, she said, “I brought you some lunch. I thought you might be hungry.”

Yuri stared at her for another few seconds before saying, “Thanks.”

She set the plate on the desk, glancing at the coin necklace Yuri had tossed there the moment he was alone. When she turned around, her eyebrows were knit with conflict. “Yuri, I - I’m sorry.”

Yuri slowly shrugged. “What do you have to be sorry for? You only conspired to condemn me to a gory death.”

Christabel flinched and mumbled, “I didn’t mean to….”

Yuri rolled his eyes. “You didn’t mean to? How do you ‘accidentally’ suggest killing someone to an angry crowd?”

“No! I mean, yes, but I didn’t mean it to be… I was just….”

“Yeah, I get it.” Yuri shook his head. “You didn’t mean to kill me. It was supposed to be Flynn, right?” And didn’t that just boil his blood. Christabel had written to Flynn and intended him to come alone. She had intended Flynn to be the one sitting here contemplating getting ripped apart by a forest monster. “Estelle wasn’t lying when she said I was friends with the commandant, so if your excuse is ‘sorry, I meant to kill Flynn instead’, it’s not gonna endear you to me.”

Christabel sank into the chair and hunched over, face in hands. “I’m so sorry, Yuri. I’m sorry you’re going to die. I’m sorry I originally tried to kill your friend. But even though I’m sorry… I don’t want to die.” She risked peeking over her hands. “You understand, right? You’re sitting exactly where I was yesterday. You know how I felt. So, I did something bad to escape that fate.”

Yuri gave her a hard look. Did she really think he would sympathize with her? “I can understanding wanting to escape a flaming pit. I can’t understand throwing someone else into it.”

“I know it’s awful. Maybe I am a horrible person, but - but at least I’ll be an alive one.” Her eyes shut and tears squeezed out. “My mom was taken by the Crukh when I was a little girl. I sat awake all night until I heard her screaming. I hear those screams every time I close my eyes.” She saw Yuri’s expression and quickly spoke before he could open his mouth. “I’m not trying to get your sympathy. I’m just trying to explain why I did this awful thing.”

“If you know it’s so awful, why did you do it?”

“Not everyone is brave like you. But… it was easier to do it when I was writing the letter to some name I’d never met. It seemed so simple at the time - just get some outsider no one cares about here and let him die instead! But then you and Estelle came, and you’re both so nice, and you’re not just a recipient on an envelope, you’re a real person.” She ran her hands over her face and through her hair. “I really did hope you would kill the Crukh this morning.”

“Oh, well, that makes everything better. You weren’t lying about _that_.”

Her expression wavered and then hardened before slipping back behind her hands. “It’s alright. You don’t have to understand and you don’t have to forgive me. You shouldn’t, really, because what I’ve done to you is horrible. But I don’t want to die.”

Yuri snorted. “And I do?”

She took a deep breath and sat upright. “I _am_ sorry. One of us has to die and, well, it’s like Estelle said you helped her realize. It’s not ok to be ok with dying. And I’m not ok with it.”

Yuri let out a frustrated breath. “When I said that, I didn’t mean that you should resort to living at all costs, even at the expense of someone else’s life.”

“But that’s what you argued for! Yesterday, when you encouraged me to run away and let anyone who stayed behind face the consequences!”

“That’s different!”

“It is not! It’s just more exchanging lives.” She sat up even straighter. “You were ok with damning dozens of villagers to death to save me, but now that you’re the one who’s going to die to save me, it’s suddenly evil.”

“We would have warned them that you were gone. We would have given them the chance to run away. You’re planning to tie me up and ring the dinner bell.”

“What about the blastia, then? Estelle told me about Midbell. You chose to get rid of blastia to save more people, and all those people died horribly.”

“That’s not comparable at all. Getting rid of blastia was the only way to save the world. Everyone would die if we kept them around - Midbell was a tragedy, but not getting rid of the blastia would have been an even bigger tragedy.”

“Good, so we agree on the principle that it’s ok to let some people die in order for others to live.”

“This isn’t the same as that!”

She folded her arms. “You justify the deaths at Midbell by saying that sometimes there have to be sacrifices for the greater good. Well, now it’s your turn to be the sacrifice. Or do you only believe that when it’s other people’s lives your sacrificing?”

He’d thought he had the right to impose his will on the whole world. He’d gambled with the lives of millions. He’d known that losing blastia would result in some people dying, but those were deaths he was willing to accept in the name of saving the world. Except, it hadn’t been about saving the world, not really. Yuri had set out from Zaphias to save the lower quarter, and he’d never really abandoned that goal. The entire world was a scope he could barely comprehend; Flynn was the one who was good at big picture thinking. All Yuri had really wanted was to make sure people like Hanks and Ted had somewhere safe to go home to. He’d fought the Adephagos to defend the lower quarter and to defend Estelle, Flynn, and all the others. All of them knew that some people would die as a result of losing blastia, but Yuri had been passively sure that none of those people would be his friends and so he’d made peace with that.

“It’s not the same,” he muttered when he realized he’d been quiet for a while. “Sacrificing the blastia… that’s a debate for another day. You’re arguing about sacrificing a hundred people to save a thousand, but that’s not what you’ve done here. You’re just swapping out one for one.”

She shrugged a little. “Maybe I am. Is that so wrong? Is it wrong to want to live?”

“It’s wrong to kill other people to do it,” Yuri said while the faces of every enemy he’d ever killed to preserve his own life flashed through his mind.

“If only one of us gets to live, why shouldn’t it be me?”

Yuri’s immediate answer was, _because you were chosen as the princess_ , but he realized immediately that it wasn’t a good argument. Randomly finding a coin in a bun was not a fair way to determine who deserved to die. It was just her bad luck to end up facing the Crukh, but still, luring a stranger here to take her place was just wrong. “Because life isn’t fair. If life gives you lemons, then fuck you, now you’ve got a bunch of lemons to deal with. Even though you never asked for them and don’t deserve them, they’re still your lemons. You don’t get to shove them on someone else just because you hate lemonade. It might not be your fault that you have lemons, but they are your problem.”

Christabel stared for a moment with a thoughtful expression and then glanced away. “It’s too late, anyway. The village isn’t going to change their mind. I’m sorry you have to die for me.”

“Apology not accepted.”

She stood abruptly. “Estelle and Repede are fine. They’ve been given permission to leave, but refuse to. I’ll make sure they don’t come to any harm.”

Yuri was grateful for the reassurance, but given everything Christabel had done, he didn’t feel inclined to thank her. He was even more grateful when she left.

Once he was alone, Yuri stood and moved to the window. He stared through the glass and then lifted the window to let a hot breeze wash over him. In the distance, trees rustled. The side of his fist smashed into the window frame with enough force to smart. “Fuck.”

* * *

Everything had gone all wrong, and it was her fault. Estelle sat on the tiles of the balcony with her arms around her knees and watched the treetops. Flynn had said it was a trap, hadn’t he? If only she’d listened to him. No one had ambushed them the moment they reached the woods, so she’d thought everything was fine, but the trap had been subtler than that. Now Yuri was going to be killed all because she kept running after ideas. This was just like the Sands of Kogorh, and she didn’t think Khroma was going to fly in and rescue them from her own stupidity this time.

The door to the room pushed open and Repede appeared. He flopped onto the sun-warmed tiles and rested his head on his paws.

“I’m sorry, Repede. It’s my fault Yuri isn’t here.” He was locked in Christabel’s room, with a pair of guards at the door. She hated to think of Yuri sitting alone in there, contemplating the sacrifice tomorrow night, possibly having another panic attack. It would be one thing if her stupid, impulsive decisions only hurt herself, but she kept dragging her friends into her messes.

She reached over and rested a hand on Repede’s back. Her fingers dug into his warm fur. “We aren’t just going to sit here and let them kill him. Yuri rescued me when I was in trouble, so now it’s my turn to rescue him.”

Repede growled in agreement.

“We can’t go right now, though. We’ll have to wait until everyone is asleep. And in the meantime…” She gave Repede a quick rub and then stood. “I’m going out for a bit. Stay here, ok?”

No one stopped Estelle on her way out the building. They’d already told her she was free to return to Zaphias - urged her to leave, actually. Estelle had considered it with the idea of rushing back to get Flynn and Brave Vesperia to come back with her and rescue Yuri, but there wasn’t enough time. So, she strolled across the main square with nothing but uncertain looks from the villagers she passed. As she passed the hill, she couldn’t help staring at the twin wooden posts by the bank of the river. Despite the sunshine, it seemed like a dark shadow hung over them. She couldn’t let Yuri be put there.

Estelle made her way along the dirt road. Birds chirped, the river babbled, and insects buzzed their delight at summer. On any other occasion, she would have thought this was a beautiful day, perfect for having a picnic or just lying in the grass to feel the sun warm her skin. It wasn’t fair for such horrible things to happen on such a lovely day.

She cut across a field of weeds and grass to reach Gideon’s house. She knocked hesitantly at first, gained courage, and then added a couple more firm knocks.

The door opened and Gideon gave her a tired look. “Ah. Should have expected you.”

“Hello Mr. Gideon, sir. I wanted to talk to you about… well, I wanted to ask for your help.”

“You’re not going to get it.”

He started to close the door, but Estelle threw her hand up to catch it. “Wait! I haven’t even asked yet!”

“I know what you’re going to ask, and the answer is no. I’m not going to help you rescue your friend from the Crukh.”

“Please?” She kept her grip on the door even though Gideon didn’t move to close it again, just in case. “You’re the only one in the village who doesn’t approve of the sacrifices. You think it’s horrible, too. If you think it’s so horrible, why won’t you help me?”

“It’s horrible, yeah, but horrible stuff is sometimes necessary.”

“No!” Estelle stamped her foot. “You don’t even know for sure that that Crukh will hurt you if you don’t sacrifice someone!” She knew the Crukh was real; her experience in the woods yesterday was proof enough. That experience had also shown her, however, that the Crukh was not entirely corporeal. It had drifted into her mind, slunk around the trees, infected them with its presence. When she’d climbed down to rescue Yuri from the den, her guilt over the massacre at Midbell had nearly consumed her and made her want to turn her sword on herself. The Crukh was a manipulator and acted by influencing others. That didn’t fit with the idea of a beast that would physically raze a village to the ground.

Of course, it had to be physical enough to cast a silhouette on the road the night she followed Christabel, and physical enough to make the sacrifices disappear every year….

“You’re talking about gambling with human lives,” Gideon said. “You’re willing to bet the lives of every villager on your belief that the Crukh won’t follow through on his threat. Me? I’m not a betting man. Never was one for uncertainty. I’m not willing to chance my own life to help some stranger.”

“But… but it’s the right thing to do. If someone is going to die, and you can help but choose to do nothing, that makes you culpable for their death.” Estelle’s mind raced to find words that might convince him. She had less than a day to save Yuri’s life and the pressure made her want to throw up.

Gideon shrugged. “I never said all of us weren’t responsible for the deaths. It’s the responsibility we accept by continuing to live here.”

Estelle wanted to scream. The fact that Yuri was going to be sacrificed to ensure good crops and ward off sickness was so obviously a horrible, devastating, life-ruining problem and it didn’t make sense that she couldn’t impart her desperate need to save him onto Gideon. All the angry thoughts she had about the village came spilling out in a rant. “This is sick. It’s wrong and it’s horrible. You’re all just brainwashed to believe it’s ok to sacrifice one person so everyone else can live happily, but that’s a horrible way to live! Maybe we don’t have perfect crops or ideal lives in the outside world, but we spread the suffering around. When I’m in trouble, I can lean on my friends, and they lean on me, too. Here you just pile all of the suffering onto one person a year and let them alone bear the burden and it’s cruel and awful and you should be ashamed of yourselves!”

Gideon was unmoved by her speech. If he had moved anywhere, it was into annoyance. “Oh, you spread it around out there, do ya? Everyone gets a little misery so nobody has it all? Don’t lecture me, little miss princess, like I don’t know what life in Zaphias is like. My wife and I packed up and moved to Zaphias fifteen years ago ‘cause she was pretty fed up with the system here, too.”

Estelle faltered. “She… you what?”

“Didn’t know that, huh? Thought I was some dumb hick who was clueless about the big city? Surely I’d agree with you if I only understood what your world was like?”

“I… um….” Her face felt hot. She _had_ assumed he was ignorant of the real world, and wasn’t sure where to go next.

“Maybe that’s what life is like for you in the castle. Everyone gets to be just a little bit unhappy so that nobody is completely unhappy. Maybe if you had experience with the real world, you’d know where I’m comin’ from. We lived in the lower quarter, and my little boy got sick. Gald is everything in Zaphias, and we had hardly any. You ever watch your child die, knowing exactly what you need to give him but being unable to afford it?”

“No… I’m so sor-”

“Don’t apologize to me. So maybe we let one person die horribly every year in Yewbrooke, but my son died horribly in Zaphias, and I didn’t even get a full belly and nice weather out of it.”

Words caught in Estelle’s throat because there was nothing she could say to that.

“Sorry your boyfriend’s gonna eat it - or, ha, get eaten - but, to be honest, that’s not my problem.”

Estelle lived to help others. In fact, it had taken a lot of self-reflection and experiences with her friends to realize she could even have life goals beyond helping others. The idea of someone simply not caring enough to want to help save a life was incomprehensible to her. “But… but….”

“If you’re just going to keep yelling at me about ethics, I’d sooner go back to my lunch if you wouldn’t mind.”

Estelle’s hand, still gripping the door, made it shake. “But Yuri….”

“Sorry for your loss.” He grabbed the door and yanked it out of her weakened gripped.

The door slammed shut, along with her options. She stared at it for a second, and then turned away with a huff. Fine. She’d rescue Yuri by herself.

Back at the great house, Estelle closed the front door behind her and paused to take a deep breath. It took a lot of effort to not cry with frustration. She couldn’t help but think that if their places were reversed, Yuri would have a plan for rescuing her by now.

“Estelle?” Christabel entered the front hall and approached her with a tense face. “I wanted to-”

“Not now, Christabel.”

“Please. Can we talk?”

Estelle’s heart throbbed with anger when she looked at the other girl. “I don’t have anything to say to you.” If they talked now, Estelle was sure she would say something she regretted. Even worse, she might say something truly awful and then not regret it at all.

Estelle walked past her toward the stairs.

“Wait - I want to say I’m sorry for everything.”

One hand on the banister, Estelle couldn’t stop herself from whipping around. “You can’t apologize for something you’re still doing!”

“I don’t want Yuri to die, either.”

Estelle shook with anger and felt tears welling up in her eyes. She’d always been envious of people like Yuri or Rita who could stoke fury in themselves without it making them cry. “You lured us here and betrayed us. It’s your fault Yuri is even in this position.”

“I know. I don’t want him to die, but I’m not… strong enough. Someone has to die and every time I think about stepping back into that role, I just… I can’t do it.”

Estelle wondered how she would have felt if she had been told that someone else she barely knew could die instead and that would solve her aer problem. She wanted to believe she still would have accepted the possibility of her death if they couldn’t find another way, but the moment of hesitation she had before reaching that conclusion was enough to give Christabel a modicum of sympathy. “It doesn’t matter anyway,” Estelle said instead. “Yuri and I met the Crukh and I don’t think the village is in danger in the first place.”

“You… what?”

“It’s a manipulator. It was all around us but not physically there. It isn’t a huge monster that can smash buildings. It didn’t hurt me; it made me want to hurt myself.”

“You mean… all this time… everyone who’s died for him… my mother….”

“I don’t know. I think the Crukh just wants sacrifices and scares people into thinking it’ll destroy the town, but it’s all a bluff.”

Christabel slowly shook her head. “No….” She looked over her shoulder fearfully and then said in a lower voice, “This is blasphemy. Let’s go to your room and not be overheard.”

Estelle continued up the stairs with Christabel close behind. They went back to her room, where Estelle once again couldn’t stop looking at the empty bed where Yuri ought to be.

“You’re wrong about the Crukh,” Christabel said as soon as the door closed. “How could we have been wrong about him for a thousand years? Besides, even if it is a bluff, if we deny him, he’ll stop protecting the town and we’ll be destroyed anyway.”

Estelle noticed how quickly Christabel had gone from denying the very possibility of the Crukh bluffing, to justifying their traditions even if it was. “Not necessarily. There’s a town in Hypionia - Aurnion - that survives being surrounded by monsters by using wooden walls.”

Christabel rubbed her temples. “Estelle, you can’t… my mother died for this. You can’t say it was all a lie!”

“And Yuri might still die for this!”

“So might everyone else in the village!” She threw her hands out in exasperation, and then took a breath to calm herself. When she spoke again, her voice was flat like she was reciting something she had been taught from a young age. “It’s simple math. One life or three hundred lives?”

“It doesn’t have to be either. It could be zero lives,” Estelle said. “But even then, even if the Crukh is real, and making one person die horribly every year is the price you pay for utopia, I think… I think a utopia that has a dark and rotten core isn’t really a utopia at all. If grisly death is built into the foundations, is it really a utopia?”

“No,” Christabel said. “It isn’t, but neither is Zaphias.”

Gideon’s words flashed back in Estelle’s mind. Maybe they didn’t intentionally sacrifice people in Zaphias, but they certainly allowed death and tragedy to take place. How many people starved in the lower quarter while she overindulged in the castle? “Whether it’s right or wrong to sacrifice someone for a peaceful life, Yuri isn’t part of that. He never benefited from living here. It isn’t fair to force him to pay for your happiness.”

Christabel looked away. “It’s not fair. But there’s no going back now. I’m sorry.”

Before Estelle could retort, Christabel left the room.

When she was gone, Estelle fell face-forward on her bed and pressed her face into the pillow. She didn’t scream, but she did moan and that helped get the frustration out. Then, she could sit up and look at Repede, who sat by the door with a worried flick of his tail.

“It’s going to be ok, Repede. Tonight, you and I are going to get Yuri out of here and then we’re going back to Zaphias and never going into another dumb forest again.”


	9. The Ceremony

Estelle didn’t go to sleep that night. She sat awake, gearing herself up for what they would have to do tonight. She’d been nervous all evening, and terrified of giving herself away during dinner. Luckily, any anxiety she’d shown had been brushed off as general stress about Yuri’s fate.

Before heading to bed, Mayor Gower had pulled her aside and once again urged her to leave Yewbrooke. He recommended she and Repede set out first thing in the morning, because staying for the rest of the day to witness the ceremony that evening would only upset her. Estelle had said she’d consider it, and then spitefully packed her and Yuri’s bags in her room. She would leave before the ceremony, but she would be taking Yuri with her.

“Are you ready, Repede?” she whispered. There was no clock in the room, but she guessed it was around midnight.

Repede gave a low growl and stood by the door.

Estelle shouldered her pack and carried Yuri’s. Then she pushed the door open and crept into the hall. There were two guards on duty at the door to Yuri’s room. They were little more than a pair of villagers given carving knives as a weapon, and they slouched in a pair of chairs on either side of the door. They hadn’t noticed her creep into the hallway, but they did notice when golden light erupted around her. Unfortunately for them, that notice wasn’t enough time to do anything before she hit them with the full force of a Grand Chariot.

The light in the dark hallway almost blinded her, and it ruined her night vision. When it finally faded, she had to listen for any sign that they were still moving, heard nothing, and trusted they had been knocked out. “Let’s go,” she whispered to Repede and hurried down the hall. Her night vision was starting to come back when she reached them, so she stuck a hand in one of their pockets and found the key. She heard movement from her feet as she unlocked the door. Good - they weren’t dead, but bad - they were going to get up soon.

Estelle pushed the door open and found Yuri sitting on the bed, alert and dressed.

“Yuri!” she said in a frantic whisper. “Oh good, you’re up.”

Yuri got to his feet. “Yeah, turns out the prospect of being ritually sacrificed the next day makes it hard to sleep. I saw your light. Holy Lance?”

“Grand Chariot. C’mon!”

Yuri wasted no more time in following Estelle into the hall. He took his backpack from her and they moved quickly to the staircase. Behind them, the guards were starting to get up, so they quickened their pace. They made too much noise going down the stairs, but Estelle was focused on just getting out the front door. Crossing the woods at night would be dangerous, and she didn’t even want to think about the possible danger in going out in the village at night, but it was their only shot.

They reached the bottom of the stairs at the same time one of the guards start to shout. Doors slammed open and Estelle pushed herself even faster. Yuri reached the front door first and threw it open. Outside was a sea of shadows, and Yuri stopped on the front step so suddenly that Estelle crashed into him and they both toppled to the dirt right in front of the stairs.

“Ack! Sorry!” Estelle dislodged herself from Yuri and hopped up. “Hurry!”

Footsteps thundered down the stairs from inside. They had to go now, but Yuri was still on his hands and knees, head down, breathing short and fast.

“Yuri?”

Repede barked, ran a little way toward the exit, and then looped around with more frantic barking. Yuri didn’t move and when Estelle looked closer, she realized he was shaking.

“Oh no.” Estelle fell to one knee and put a hand on his shoulder. “Oh, Yuri, no, not now. You have to get up! They’re coming!”

Yuri couldn’t respond to her. His came so fast that he could barely get any oxygen before shooting it out again. She couldn’t tell if he was even aware of her hand on his shoulder.

“Yuri, please.” She shook him. “They’re coming!” This wasn’t going to work. Yuri had said the only thing she could do for him was get him to a quiet place to calm down, but there was no time to calm down. They had to run because within thirty seconds, they would be surrounded. “Yuri!” Estelle stood, grabbed Yuri under the arm, and tried to pull him up. She would carry him all the way to Zaphias if she needed to.

Except he was too heavy for her. His body was dead weight and she could only get on arm up. She crouched to loop it over her shoulder and from there was able to drag him upright, but it had taken too long. She had barely taken one staggering step with Yuri hyperventilating and barely able to support himself before someone grabbed her and dragged her back.

“No! Let go!”

Repede snarled and lunged at the person who had grabbed her, causing the man to let go with a yelp. It was too late to keep her from loosing her grip on Yuri, though, and he dropped to his knees. A candle lit the darkness and flashed across his face; she saw the terror in his eyes with a pang. Repede snarled again, but half a dozen people had responded to the guards’ shouting. Estelle reached for Yuri, but one of the household staff, a man called Ford, reached him first. Ford held Yuri’s shoulders as someone else - she couldn’t tell who in the dim light - put an arm out to stop her charge at them and then pull her back by the waist.

Repede growled, but he recognized when they were outnumbered.

“I told you to leave.” Gower’s voice cut through the din.

“We were trying to!” Estelle replied stubbornly. “You don’t want Yuri to be the sacrifice. Let us go and you can continue the ceremony as if we never came!”

Gower looked like he wanted to agree, but the five other village residents gave him an angry look. All of them were pleased with sparing Christabel; they would never agree to letting Yuri go.

“It’s took late for that,” Gower said. “If Yuri had left when I first warned him, he wouldn’t be in this mess. Now his fate is sealed. Ford, take him back to the royal residence. Dion, lock the young lady and her dog in their room until after there ceremony.”

“No!” Glowering light sprang up as Estelle started to summon another arte. It was the only chance she had.

“Stop her!” Someone shouted, and she was thrown to the floor with enough force to knock all concentration from her mind.

Dazed and horizontal, she watched Ford and one of the door guards drape Yuri’s slack arms over their shoulders and drag him up the stairs. “No…” she whispered. All she had done was make everything worse. Now Yuri was in the same predicament as before, but he was in the middle of a panic attack and had no one to calm him down. They were going to lock him in that room and let him ride it out all alone. Yuri had spent so much time being her saviour, and she had thought that just this once she could rescue him, but she’d failed.

“Get up,” Dion said, grabbing her elbow. “I don’t want to hurt you, but I will if you try to interfere again.”

Estelle glumly let him pull her to her feet. Beside her, Repede kept up a low, constant growl as his tail twitched. She half-hearted rubbed between his ears as a form of apology, but she didn’t know if he appreciated it at all. With nothing left to do, she allowed herself to be led back to her room.

Once there, she sat on her bed and listened to the lock click. This was all her fault. She was the one who had insisted to Flynn that they come here. She was the one who showed Yuri the letter. She was safe in here and would be free to go, once Yuri was dead. Why was it that whenever she made mistakes, it was people around her who paid for them?

She lay back on her pillow, but didn’t expect to get any sleep.

* * *

Yuri didn’t think he’d be able to sleep that night. After being taken back upstairs, he collapsed on the bed and buried his head under the pillow until the waves of panic finally abated and he was able to breathe again. The worst part was finally getting his mind to stop fixating on his imminent death thanks to the panic attack, and slipping back into the regular fixation on the only-slightly-less-imminent death he faced the next day.

He didn’t even know what had triggered the attack. His nerves had been taut from the rush of breaking out that it must have taken practically nothing to make them snap. Had he seen something when he stepped outside? It had been so dark out there, he didn’t know what he might have seen. Maybe he’d seen the same lurking figure Estelle has described from the other night, or maybe it had been nothing at all and his idiot brain had sabotaged their escape attempt over nothing. He supposed it didn’t matter; whatever the trigger, it had led to him being stuck here once again with no ideas for avoiding a grisly death. It was only the exhaustion from the attack that let him fall asleep at all, although he wasn’t sure if falling asleep was really the same as passing out.

He ended up sleeping through most of the morning, drifting through nightmares filled with blood and trees. It wasn’t until the door opened that he bolted awake in the bright light of noon. Christabel was setting a plate with a sandwich on the desk by the door. A muffin and glass of apple juice was already there, and Yuri’s skin crawled to think someone had come in to deliver breakfast without him waking.

“Sorry for waking you,” Christabel said.

Yuri sat upright on the bed and made no movement for lunch. “You should have woken me up sooner. It’s my last day alive, after all, I should be awake to enjoy it.”

Christabel cringed. Instead of responding, she said, “I heard about your escape attempt last night.”

“Mad you weren’t awake to catch us yourself?”

“It’s just as well you got caught. You wouldn’t have made it out of the village. He wouldn’t have let you go.”

“What would he do, murder me? Gosh, how uniquely threatening.” Yuri rolled his eyes. “I see why you weren’t afraid to walk around the other night. Hard to threaten someone who’s already marked for death.”

“The ceremony begins tonight at six. There’s a feast, and you have to be there.”

“I’m gonna have to respectfully decline that invitation.”

“You have no choice.”

“That’s what Flynn said about the big empire-union political soiree I’m supposed to go to in a few weeks. You wouldn’t keep me from that, would you? I was so looking forward to going.” Truth be told, the thought of wearing a tie and eating tiny sandwiches from platters sounded fantastic at the moment if the alternative was gruesome death.

“That decision is no longer in my hands.”

“Figured. Where’s Estelle and Repede?”

“In your room. They’ve been locked in to prevent any other attempts at interfering with the ceremony, but they’ll be released tomorrow morning. We won’t stop them from going home.”

Yuri raised an eyebrow. “You really believe that? You think Mr. Mayor’s just going to let Estelle trot along home to tell Flynn that his village ritually sacrificed his best friend and they plan to continue murdering people every year?”

Slightly less confidently, Christabel said, “I insisted…. And he promised.”

“Yeah, but you’re not the princess anymore, are you? What say do you have? He can make all the promises he wants; that won’t stop him from killing Estelle and leaving her bloodied dress on the trail to look like she was mauled by an eggbear when Flynn comes looking next week.”

“He… he wouldn’t do that.”

“You know my biggest regret? That I won’t be here to watch you lot squirm when Flynn arrives to investigate our disappearance. Hoo boy, he can be scary when he’s angry with me, and that doesn’t even compare to how he’s going to react when he realizes you killed both of his best friends. You’re gonna wish you’d just dealt with disappointing the Crukh.”

“I won’t let anything happen to Estelle or Repede. I promise.”

“No offense, but I don’t put much stake in promises from the person who set me up to be murdered.”

She winced. “Ok… that’s fair. I will, though. For now, try to relax for the rest of the day. Someone will come get you when it’s time.”

As she left, Yuri called, “No, it’s fine, don’t bothering coming to get me, I’ll mosey on down when I’m in the mood, shall I?”

The door shut and locked. Yuri crawled out of bed and walked to the window. He pushed the glass up to let in some fresh air and then leaned his forehead against the metal bars. He couldn’t help wondering how often these bars became necessary in the past. Everyone in the village claimed to be on board with the sacrifice, but how many of them became apostates the moment they pulled the coin?

Yuri half-heartedly pushed on the bars just in case they’d magically come loose overnight. When that predictably failed, he went back to sit on his bed. The room was empty, leaving him with nothing to do all day but sit and contemplate what would happen tonight. He still didn’t know what the Crukh was and he wanted to believe that it wasn’t an actual monster that would dismember him. Their encounter in the woods had suggested it was more of a presence than a physical being. Still… something made the sacrifices scream every year, and he wasn’t keen on facing it with his hands tied.

* * *

Yuri watched the sun gradually sink lower in the sky. His heart sank along with it. All day, he’d kept thinking that something would happen. Someone would intervene and help him, Estelle, and Repede get out of here. Maybe Flynn would ride in and scold him for running off, or maybe the rest of Brave Vesperia would swoop in with Ba’ul and give them a lift back to Zaphias.

But the only people who came were Gower and the two door guards who opened the door in late evening. Gower said, “It’s time to begin the feast.”

Yuri didn’t look up from where he lay on the bed with his arms folded behind his head. “No thanks, I’m not really hungry.”

“Get up.”

The two guards approached the bed and Yuri got up to avoid being grabbed. He pushed them out of the way and walked to the door. Weirdly enough, he felt more level-headed - more like himself - than he had in weeks. Yes, he was under unimaginable stress about what was going to happen tonight, but that level of stress helped him feel normal. “Let’s get this over with.”

They didn’t let him go down the stairs first. The guards hurried to walk in front of him, with Gower behind. Yuri inspected their backs and weighed his options. He could take one of them down, he was sure. Both of them, while he was unarmed, might be tricky. The front door swung open to reveal the square had been taken over by tables and a crowd. The noise of over a hundred happy festival-goers almost drowned out a springy jig coming from a fiddle, and Yuri assumed Christabel was playing somewhere on the other side of the crowd.

Yuri judged the distance to the edge of the village. He wasn’t bound; he could run. He just had to make it into the woods and then he could find a place to hide, wait out the night, and make it back to Zaphias in the morning.

Gower seemed to notice his thoughts and grabbed his elbow. The grip was strong enough to notice, but weak enough to prove it was more symbolic than practical. “Estelle is still locked upstairs,” he said softly enough that the guards, who were already moving into the crowd, didn’t hear. “If you run, we will use her instead.”

That threat was more effective than handcuffs. Maybe he could slip away from the crowd, and maybe he could survive in the woods at night without being attacked by some monster - or something worse - but he couldn’t do that and get Estelle out of the great house. If he ran, he would condemn Estelle to the same fate he was fleeing, and that was unconscionable. “Glad to see your sacred coin-choosing tradition is going strong.”

Gower shoved him forward. “I tried to warn you to leave. You’ll get no sympathy from me after ignoring the warning.”

“You might want to append warnings about leaving with ‘or else you might be brutally murdered,’ because I use the same kind of ominous statements about not belonging in a place and needing to leave when the stakes are that we accidentally went to a restaurant with tablecloths.”

The crowd parted for him as he walked forward. They gradually quieted and turned to watch him. Gower led him through the throng and to a long table set up in the middle of the square. Food had already been laid out, but no one had touched it yet.

“You stand here.” Gower directed him to stand next to the chair at the head of the table. “Whenever everyone has taken their spot, you are to say a few words to begin the feast, and then everyone will sit after you do.”

“Can the words be ‘fuck all of you?’”

“No. Do not make a mockery of our ceremony.”

“You’re just no fun at all.”

Gower took his place at the seat immediately to the right of Yuri as the rest of the seats around the long table slowly filled. Throughout the square were scattered round tables with more seats, and Yuri half wondered what one had to do to be worthy of sitting at the main table, and half didn’t give a damn about the details of this awful village’s awful festival. Christabel, at least, had earned a spot at the main table. She stood behind a chair about halfway down, pointedly avoiding his eyes.

When everyone was settled, the crowd was eerily quiet. Yuri didn’t think the lower quarter would ever be this uniformly respectful and quiet. Even the children, held in parents’ arms or standing solemnly beside them at the round tables, were silent and watched Yuri expectantly.

Gower whispered, “Thank everyone for coming and take a seat.”

Yuri rolled his eyes. “Thanks everyone, I’m glad you all could make it to my bon voyage party. It’s really great how your community can all come together like this to celebrate my grisly demise. Makes me feel real special.” Gower was glaring knives at him, but seemed reticent to interrupt the prince during the ceremonial speech so Yuri took that as an excuse to continue with a cheery voice. “It’s a shame I didn’t have enough time to spend getting to know all of you in Yewbrooke, but I look forward to seeing you all again in hell. I do really admire you lot for your dedication to tradition and your optimistic confidence that the Crukh will be satisfied with me as a last minute replacement. So, as we say in the lower quarter, dig in!”

Yuri sat down and grabbed a chicken leg from the nearest platter while the assembled crowd processed what he’d said and glanced around uncomfortably. Estelle would probably reprimand him for starting to eat before everyone was seated, but if this was his last meal, he’d eat it however he damn well pleased.

The crowd got over their awkwardness and sat, and slowly the din of conversation grew again. Yuri dropped a chicken bone to his plate and picked up a fruit-filled pastry. “I noticed nobody tossed any of this food into a fire,” Yuri said to Gower after swallowing a delicious mouthful. “You’re not worried about punishment for not sacrificing part of it?”

Gower just looked at him for a moment before slicing into a piece of ham. “We are making a sacrifice tonight.”

“Ah.” Yuri’s enjoyment of the pastry faded.

Yuri didn’t talk for the rest of the feast. The food was objectively delicious, but he couldn’t really enjoy it. Every bit of laughter or festive voice he heard made him angrier. How could these people be in such high spirits when they were going to kill him in a couple of hours? Then he saw someone smile fondly at Christabel as they passed her a bowl of mashed potatoes. Ah, right - it was because they were going to kill him in a couple of hours.

It was the night of the summer solstice, which gave him plenty of time to dwell on what was to come before dusk. As the sun began to sink below the trees, though, the festive atmosphere began to fade. When members of the household staff came out carrying baskets of little brown buns, the crowd once again turned silent. The coin necklace had been taken from Yuri earlier that afternoon, and the coin now lay waiting in one of those buns, like a snake under a rock. Each table was given a basket, with three spaced down the length of the long table, and everyone stared at their basket with intensity until everyone had been served.

Gower stood to speak this time. Yuri wondered if this was always his job, or if he’d decided to buck tradition to prevent Yuri from speaking again. “We will now commence the selection of the prince or princess for the coming year. All those of you over the age of fifteen shall now take a bun. May the Crukh choose the worthiest of us all.” He sat and took a bun for himself.

There was silence as the crowd grabbed their bread and anxiously tore it open. Yuri spotted a mother frantically slapping her pre-teen son’s hand away from the basket, and a young couple embracing with torn-open and empty buns on their plates before them. Yuri spotted Christabel ripping her bread in half with trembling hands - probably fearing that fate was coming for her and she’d be put back on the dinner plate for next year.

Then, there came a yell. “He’s got it!”

Heads swivelled to a smaller table where Cranmer the blacksmith sat with his wife. His wife held a swaddled infant, and he held a coin in his hand. He stared at it vacantly while his wife clutched the baby.

Gower left the table to stand beside Cranmer and had him rise to his feet. Gower lifted his arm in the air and shouted, “Hail the Prince of Yewbrooke!”

“Hail!” the crowd chanted.

Gower took the coin, tied it to the necklace he’d carried in his pocket, and draped it over Cranmer’s neck. The crowd cheered, his table-mates applauded, but Cranmer and his wife suddenly looked like the only people at the party who shared Yuri’s mood.

The sun sank lower. The sky had turned a blaze of orange and Yuri absently picked at a slice of chocolate cake. He pictured Flynn’s smiling face teasing him about not being interested in cake for once in his life. Fuck. Damn. He was never going to see Flynn again. He never thought he would miss not getting to hear Flynn’s pompous ass tell him ‘I told you so,’ but he would give anything now to listen to Flynn lecture about how he and Estelle had made a mistake in coming here.

What would Karol do when he never came back? He trusted Karol and Judy to be able to carry on Brave Vesperia without him, but he couldn’t stop thinking about the look on Karol’s face when he reunited with him after Zaude. Karol was going to be devastated. Judy would pretend she was fine, but she pretended she was fine about a lot of things. He tried to imagine how Rita would react to losing Estelle, and then tried not to. He wondered if she’d ever let herself make friends again. In the privacy of his own head, Yuri could even admit that he regretted not getting to say goodbye to Raven, and that the old bastard had dealt with enough grief in his life and Yuri regretted being the one to add more.

The light was starting to get dim and the plates were empty. The closest thing Yuri had to a plan was to make a break for it as soon as they got close to the river. They wouldn’t follow him across the river, and if it was close enough to dusk, it would be too late to go back to the house and get Estelle before sundown. He didn’t like the idea of spending the night on the other side of the river, but facing the Crukh with his hands free was better than the alternative.

But then the two men who had been guarding his door appeared on either side of his chair.

“It’s time go,” Gower said, standing.

One of the men grabbed Yuri’s elbow and encouraged him to stand. Yuri rose and yanked his arm away. He wasn’t going to make a fuss, he told himself. Maybe they were going to kill him, but he could die with pride. It was bad enough that many of them had witnessed his panic attack last night; he didn’t want them to remember him as going to his death kicking and crying.

All around him, villagers rose from their chairs. Gower led the way from the plaza toward the hill, and Yuri forced himself to follow. If he didn’t make his legs move, they would grab him and drag him there, and that would make this all worse. It was like being in a dream, where you ran and ran but your legs felt like they were moving through pudding. Time was at once rushing onward faster than he could comprehend, and trickling by at a snail’s pace so he was aware of every passing second.

He ought to be more afraid, he thought when they reached the hill and began walking down to the river and the waiting posts. He’d been more afraid of entering the forest when the worst he expected was an ambush, and he’d been more afraid when stepping outside on the balcony only a few nights ago. The possibility of danger, but without any certainty of what form it would take, or where, or when, or if it even existed at all, preyed on his nerves a thousand times more than danger itself. Walking into certain death, well… this was almost old hat now. He’s been more afraid going up against Alexei or Duke, because then he’d both been sure he had a high probability of being killed and failing would mean disaster for everyone he loved.

So, rather than being scared, he was just sad and angry. It was infuriating that he was being forced to die for a village he didn’t even like, and he was so sad that he wouldn’t get to see his friends again. He’d set out from Zaphias all those months ago to save the lower quarter, and now he wouldn’t even get to watch them thrive.

They reached the base of the hill. Yuri saw a sliver of a chance at freedom, so he elbowed one guard in the waist and bolted for the river bank. He tripped over Gower’s outstretched leg, nearly fell, and was dragged back by the guard he hadn’t hit. Well, it had been worth a shot.

“Stop fighting,” Gower said as the guards wound rope tightly around both wrists. “Make peace with your fate and relax, and it will be better for you.”

Yuri kicked Gower in the shin hard enough to make the man double over with a gasp. It didn’t stop the rope from being tightened to the posts, stretching his arms wide, but it had sure felt satisfying.

When Gower straightened up, he pulled a knife from his belt and Yuri thought he had finally crossed the line. Honestly, the prospect of getting stabbed to death sounded nicer than whatever the Crukh had in store for him. Gower came toward him, but instead of stabbing his gut, he grabbed Yuri’s left elbow and slashed across his forearm. Yuri flinched at the sudden pain and jerked backed, but was stopped by the rope.

“What the hell?!”

Someone in the crowd behind Yuri passed Gower brass bowl, which he held under the wound. “Every house must be blessed by the prince,” Gower explained simply. One hand held the bowl and the other gripped Yuri’s arm, squeezing to encourage the flow of blood.

Estelle had described this to him, he suddenly remembered. There were those cloths with writing in blood hanging in every house. When she’d told the story, he had assumed the writing was done by the prince or princess themselves, rather than collecting their blood and using it like an ink. Gower squeezed the wound and Yuri chewed on his lip to hold in any sign of pain. The crowd behind him was silent, which was eerie in its own right, even if it didn’t mean he could perfectly hear the squelch of the bloody wound getting manipulated.

Yuri did his best not to look to distract his mind from the pain, but the only other place to look was the forest ahead. The sun was low in the sky now, casting long shadows between the trees. He expected to see something lurking there, but they appeared deceptively empty.

At last Gower pulled away and Yuri let out a tense breath. He barely paid attention as someone else wrapped a bandage tightly around the wound. His head spun from the blood loss and part of him hoped to pass out before anything more awful could happen.

Gower passed the bowl to someone else and then held up his blood-covered hands. “My dear neighbours! Tonight we thank the Crukh for keeping us safe.”

Behind Yuri, the congregation dutifully recited, “Thank you.”

“We thank the Crukh for blessing us with health and friendship.”

“Thank you.”

“We thank the Crukh for providing us with plentiful food and clean water.”

Yuri cringed through the continued recitation of thanks. Even now, tied up and bleeding, he found it surreal to believe that this many people were on board with his slaughter.

“To show our thanks for all the Crukh has done for us,” Gower continued, “we give back only a fraction of everything he has given us.”

The crowd gave one final, “Thank you,” while Yuri glowered.

“Gower,” Yuri said in a low voice. “Tell Estelle that I said that if she tells Flynn what happened here, Flynn will definitely lead troops to the village and ransack it.”

Gower startled at his words. “I beg your pardon?”

“I know you plan to get rid of her. But trust me, if you convince her that telling the truth will get little babies killed in a raid, she won’t say a peep. You can let her go.”

“I already said I would allow her to go free.” He said it flatly, without putting much effort into trying to convince Yuri.

“Tell her,” Yuri insisted. “You don’t have to hurt her.”

“Her fate has already been decided,” Gower said, and then addressed the crowd in a much louder voice. “The darkness comes. Go now to your homes, and tomorrow let us begin a new year!”

“Tell her, Gower!” Yuri shouted as the mayor left. He was ignored, and he listened to the crowd disperse up the hill.

It didn’t take long before the hill fell silent and Yuri was left alone with the forest. Now that he was alone, he could try to escape in earnest. He tugged at his wrists, but feared that only tightened the knots. Leaning over to untie them with his teeth didn’t work either; he couldn’t lean far enough without tension from the other arm pulling him back. The posts were too spread apart to try to kick them down, and he wasn’t flexible enough to reach the knots with his feet.

The last glimpse of the sun retreated behind the trees and Yuri stared at the forest. Did the Crukh come immediately after nightfall, or did it wait until midnight? His arm ached after struggling reignited the pain. There was really no way out. He was really going to die because a stupid village had a stupid ritual and a stupid teenager wiggled out of it by throwing him in the line of fire. Yuri fostered the flame of anger and focused on it, because it was better than giving in to the despair that his life really was over and he’d never get to see his friends again.

He gritted his teeth, glared defiantly across the river, and waited for whatever the forest would throw at him.


	10. In Ruins

Yuri watched the moon rise. It was still only a few days off from being full, so it gave plenty of illumination. Unfortunately, the only thing it illuminated was Yuri’s predicament.

Don’t scream, he told himself. No matter what happened, he couldn’t let Estelle hear him. There was no chance of her sleeping tonight, and he couldn’t bear the thought of her last memory of him being cries of pain. It was bad enough that already her last memory would be him slumped to the floor, useless and defenceless in the throes of a panic attack. Estelle would need her wits about her to escape Yewbrooke alive tomorrow, and he couldn’t do anything to worsen her restless night.

He wondered how many other villagers were lying awake tonight. Were kids sitting at their windows hoping to catch a glimpse of the elusive Crukh? Were Cranmer and his wife sitting up long into the night to talk about what they would do next year with a baby and a sacrificed father? Was Christabel lying in bed, torn up with guilt? He fucking hoped so.

Yuri had never felt this much rage directed at a population so large before. He hated the people of Yewbrooke even more than he hated the nobles of Zaphias. At least the nobles only sacrificed people they would never meet and not their own neighbours. Then again, maybe hatred was based on proximity and he couldn’t imagine a position more perfectly suited for despising Yewbrooke than tied uncomfortably to a pair of posts and waiting to be killed. He hoped the Crukh thought swapping Christabel out for him at the last minute was cheating and destroyed the whole rotten town - after Estelle and Repede got out, of course.

In the distance, trees rustled. A spike of dread shot through his heart and revitalized his attempts to wriggle out of the ropes. Yuri realized that all this time, there had still been some glimmer of hope clinging in his soul that surely he would find a way out of this. Surely he wouldn’t really die tonight. That hope was finally extinguishing as the forest grew silent, as if holding its breath in anticipation. Something was coming.

Something else was coming, too, and he heard it creeping through the grass behind him. “Who’s there?” He craned his neck over his shoulder, but saw nothing. Paranoia flooded him. Had he actually heard something? Maybe the Crukh didn’t come from the forest after all. It might dwell in the heart of the village, and was now sneaking up behind him -

“Quiet,” someone whispered and then Christabel appeared from his other side.

Yuri raised his eyebrow. “Bit late for an evening stroll, don’t you think?”

“Shut up.” She pulled out a knife.

After what had happened the last time someone pulled a knife out, Yuri was reasonably concerned when she approached his arm with it. “Hold on, what are you -”

Christabel sliced through the rope. Yuri stared as she went to cut the other one. When both hands were free, Yuri clutched his bandaged arm to add more pressure. “Didn’t expect to see you here.”

“We have to go.” She grabbed his elbow and dragged him back up the hill.

Yuri pulled his arm away; he’d had enough of being manhandled tonight. “You should have told me you were going to do this. Saved me some stress.”

“I didn’t know I was going to do this until ten minutes ago.” She didn’t look at him until they reached the top of the hill. There, she paused and turned to him. “But then I couldn’t stop thinking about how awful it was to listen to my mom die, and I was dreading hearing you go through that. And I thought about my father, who had had enough of Yewbrooke and what he’d say about this… and, well….”

“And what about the threat of the town being destroyed?”

She shook her head. “Don’t make me question myself again, but I think Estelle was right. The Crukh didn’t harm you when you went to its lair. There’s no evidence of it physically touching anyone. But I’m sure it can still be dangerous if it gets into your head, so we’d better go.” She started hurrying across the plaza.

“Hold on, we have to get Estelle and Repede.”

Christabel whirled around. She spoke in a rushed whisper. “No. There isn’t time and it’s too risky to enter the great house without being seen. You need to get out of Yewbrooke now; Estelle can meet up with you tomorrow morning.”

Yuri shook his head. “I don’t trust Gower. I’m not leaving without her.”

“Yuri!” She ran after him.

It was weird how clear the night felt. He’d grown accustomed to feeling a heavy blanket of dread whenever the sun was gone since they got here. Was it just because the dire situation had finally cleared his head and given him something else to focus on? Or could it be that the source of the dread wasn’t lurking around the village tonight, but was somewhere else, gearing itself up for a feast? Yuri wanted to be out of the village before they found out.

They rounded the house and stopped under the canopy of the tree that grew by the balcony. This close to windows, Yuri whispered as quietly as he could. “I’m climbing up to get them. Do you have a hairpin so I can pick the lock?”

Christabel fished in her pocket and handed one over. Then she hugged herself, pressed against the wall, and looked over her shoulder toward the river. “Hurry.”

Yuri grabbed the lowest branch of the tree and began the climb. He’d climbed many trees in his life, but never with his arm this injured or the stakes so high. Every time he had to use his left arm to pull himself higher, the pain spiked and threatened to send him toppling down. The persistent wooziness that came from losing that much blood made balancing on the branches precarious and he was amazed he hadn’t fallen by the time he was level with the balcony. From there, it was one more big leap to land on the railing, pinwheel his arms, and throw himself forward so that he fell onto the balcony and not to the ground.

A sudden growl said his actions were loud enough to wake up Repede at least, and a moment later he heard Estelle call, “Who’s there?”

Yuri straightened up and knocked on the windowed door. Just loud enough for her to hear, but hopefully no one else in the building, he said, “Knock-knock. Delivery.”

“Yuri!” Estelle gasped and ran to the door. She pressed her hands against the glass and beamed. “Is it really you?”

“In the flesh. Hold on, I gotta pick this lock.” As Yuri fiddled with the lock, the sense of dread he’d associated with the night began to creep back over him. He couldn’t hear any crickets and not a single owl hooted. There wasn’t even a breeze to rustle the trees. It made his back feel exposed as he worked and the desire to finish as quickly as he could just to get inside made his hands shake. This time, he knew for a fact that whatever was coming from the dark woods was looking for him.

The lock clicked and Yuri pushed it open. As soon as she could, Estelle threw herself at him and hugged him so tightly it made it hard to breathe. Or, maybe that was just the tension in his chest.

“Oh, Yuri, I’m so glad to see you. I was so afraid that-”

“I know.” He patted her back. “But we need to leave right now.”

“Is it safe to run into the woods tonight?”

Yuri hated the idea of spending the whole night in the woods with no form of shelter, but, “Safer than staying here. Climb down the tree and I’ll get Repede.”

Months ago, Yuri would have helped Estelle reach the tree and watched to make sure she made it down safely. By now, he more than trusted her to climb down a tree by herself. They’d been through worse. He entered the room and grabbed sheets off the bed. This was one of the few occasions where Repede needed his help because he regrettably lacked a primate’s skill at climbing trees. Yuri’s best idea was to make a rope harness out of sheets and use that to lower Repede to safety.

Repede paced around the room while Yuri tied the sheets together. His ears were alert and hackles raised. At least Yuri didn’t have to worry that it was just his anxiety acting up telling him they were in danger and needed to leave right now. Yuri didn’t know what the Crukh would do if they came face to face with it while fleeing, or if it even had a face to begin with, but didn’t want to find out.

When Yuri finished tying the sheets, Repede sat still and let Yuri wrap the make-shift rope around his chest and stomach. “Sorry, this will probably be uncomfortable,” Yuri said on the balcony. Repede barked that he could handle it and Yuri rested the sheet on the railing of the balcony to act as a pulley. It was difficult to hold Repede’s weight with his injured arm. He gritted his teeth and eased him down. When Repede was a couple of feet off the ground, Yuri let go of the rope and Estelle rushed to untie Repede.

Yuri massaged his aching arm and took a moment to lean against the wall and stop his head from spinning. He couldn’t rest long, though, because they were running out of time and he wanted to be out of the village before the Crukh realized he wasn’t still tied up on the river bank. So, Yuri took a deep breath and pushed himself upright. He ran to the side of the balcony -

And then a roar like wind in a tornado ripped through the village as the ground began to rumble.

* * *

In her dream, Estelle ran down the streets of Midbell from one wounded civilian to the next. For every person she saved, more and more were found around a corner. The last thing she remembered was drenching her hands in an old woman’s blood while the victim asked softly, “Why did you let this happen?”

Then she woke up under the tree where she’d fallen asleep, and didn’t feel like she’d arrived anywhere better.

Yewbrooke was in tatters. All morning, she had helped drag injured villagers out of destroyed cottages. There were no undamaged structures left standing. Those that hadn’t been knocked over by the earthquake had had roofs ripped off and walls crumbled by a wind so fierce Estelle swore it had been physical, which had roared as if it were a rampaging monster. Then came the rain falling in sheets of ice that made it hard to breathe without half-drowning, and the lightning that scorched the ground, set trees ablaze, and shattered windows. In some places, stone was scored by long slashes, that Estelle insisted had been made by metal farm equipment blown by the wind, even if they did look so much like the claw marks of an enormous beast.

Within the wreckage were the people of Yewbrooke. The disaster had come at night, when everyone was tucked away in their beds. So many people hadn’t had even had time to leave those beds before the attack came, let alone flee outside. Not that outside was free from danger, either. Estelle, Repede and Christabel had hunkered down in the field behind the great house to escape the lightning, arms over their heads to protect from flying debris, clinging together to avoid being swept away by a burst of wind. The earthquake lasted only a few minutes, but the storm raged for hours until the field had become thick with mud that covered Estelle’s legs.

The rescue effort began before dawn. When the storm finally ended, those that could still walk staggered into the main square, lost and confused. Lanterns were lit, injuries were healed by Estelle, and then they had begun the search for those survivors who hadn’t been able to walk out. They’d spread all the wounded out in the main square, and then Estelle moved down the rows and casted healing artes until she was so worn out that she collapsed under a tree.

Awake again, she looked to the square with a quiver in her heart. All told, at least half the village had come away with an injury in need of a healing arte. A quarter of them were injured enough that even with her artes, they still lay on makeshift pallets made from lengths of wood to keep them out of the mud. Then, there were almost that many who had been past the point of healing. They lay in a different corner of the plaza, covered in sheets, until graves could be dug. Estelle hoped that they would find more injured than deceased as they dug into the ruins of the buildings, but she didn’t have much optimism.

There had to be at least one more survivor under the wreckage, though. Her last glimpse of Yuri had been him standing on the balcony, throwing his arms out for balance as the ground swayed. Then he’d shouted at them to get out of there, and Christabel had had to drag her away to keep from getting his by debris falling off the building.

Estelle felt miserable sitting here and resting in the shade with the remains of the great house in view. Yuri hadn’t been brought to the plaza for healing, which meant he was still down there. He had to be deep, because Repede couldn’t pinpoint his scent to start digging, but he was there and he had to be alive. He just had to.

Christabel found Estelle with a bowl of soup in hand. “Here.” She sat on a rock and passed it to Estelle.

Estelle took it without a word. She hadn’t eaten since dinner last night, and after exhausting her energy on healing this morning, she was famished. Even though she knew she had only napped when she’d drained herself so thoroughly that staying awake any longer was physically impossible, she felt guilty for sleeping. Christabel had been working throughout her nap to prepare food for the survivors.

For a long minute, the girls sat in silence and took in the sight. The storm had cleared as suddenly as it had begun, leaving them with an indecently blue sky. Birds tweeted, leaves rustled, and the hot summer sun shone a bright light on the village’s suffering. It wasn’t right.

“We don’t have much food,” Christabel said softly. “Most people’s supplies were demolished, and the gardens were torn up. We’ve pooled everything together to ration it.”

“That’s a good idea,” Estelle said in lieu of anything practical to suggest.

“We’re just… we’re only trying to….” Christabel buried her face in her hands and broke into tears. “Th-this is all my fault.”

Estelle was too coated in mud and dried blood to think a hug from her would be comforting, so she stared at her hands and let Christabel cry. There was no point trying to convince Christabel that it wasn’t her fault, because Estelle knew that nothing she could say would convince her of that. “It’s my fault, too,” she said. “I’m the one who convinced you that the Crukh was bluffing. If I hadn’t told you that, then….” Then Yuri would be dead, but the village would be safe. Even though she hadn’t been able to wash the stickiness of blood off her hands all morning, she still couldn’t say that the alternative would have been better. Assuming, of course, that Yuri was alive.

They hadn’t been able to find him yet. Repede was off sniffing around the rubble of the great house, tirelessly searching. They knew he head to be around there, but the biggest building in the village had left the biggest pile of debris. So far, they’d only managed to recover two household staff members from the house. Yuri was under there somewhere, and Estelle wouldn’t let herself believe he’d been killed. Yuri surviving was the silver lining of all this devastation, and she couldn’t bear to lose him, too.

A man walked down the road past their tree. He walked with a limp, his arm in a sling. As he passed, he looked their way and gave them a wicked glare that made Estelle lean back from the force of it. Christabel had been too busy crying to notice, but Estelle watched him walk away with a worried frown. She wasn’t sure how much longer she and Christabel would be welcome in Yewbrooke.

* * *

Consciousness came to Yuri slowly. He drifted through a familiar dream of pulsing tentacles filling the sky and roaming through the ruins of the lower quarter. When the emotional agony of surveying his destroyed home faded and he came more fully into consciousness, physical agony replaced it. The pain came from everywhere, stabbing him from all directions, and it didn’t take long until it overwhelmed his brain and gave it no choice but to shut down and take him back into nightmares.

That happened again. And again. Every time, he felt a snap of relief to be rid of the nightmare, only to be struck by overwhelming pain from all sides that made his mind immediately flee into unconsciousness again, back to the waiting nightmares. He was never conscious long enough to even open is eyes, let alone take stock of what had happened. In his fleeting brushes with awareness, he couldn’t even scrape together the memories to understand why he hurt so much.

On what might have been the dozenth time attempting consciousness, Yuri finally managed to open his eyes. This made him wonder where he was, but the world was too dark to offer any details. It must be the middle of the night, which meant he had an excuse to be asleep, so he closed his eyes again and let sleep take him before the agony in his leg could creep any higher into his torso. When he opened them again after a what felt like eons in dream time, it was still dark. This time, Yuri had scrounged up enough awareness to realize he wasn’t looking at the night sky, but at a stone surface a few inches from his face. It might actually be daytime, he realized; he was just indoors.

Where was he? The desire to pass out and not deal with the dozens of alarm bells his body’s pain receptors were setting off was tempting, but at last the curiosity about his situation overpowered the desire to sleep. Yuri’s memory of what had happened was fuzzy, but as he concentrated, it slowly came back to him. He was sure that he had been outside when the ground began to shake. How had he gotten inside? And where was this inside, anyway? He remembered standing on the balcony, and then suddenly everything had become very loud and the floor had fallen out from below his feet.

Rubble. Yuri blinked a few more times and pieced together the stone over his head. He was under a pile of rubble. The great house had collapsed and he was under it. There was just enough light to see that he was in a small pocket within the pile of bricks, beams, and stone slabs, but it must be filtering around several angles because he couldn’t actually see any daylight. A slab of stone had fallen horizontally over him, giving him barely a foot of space between the ground and its underside. He was lucky - it had created a ceiling over his body that protected him from being crushed.

Yuri pulled his arms to his chest to inspect the damage. Both of them hurt like hell, and the bandage around his left was damp - likely stained with blood, though it was hard to see clearly. The right one hurt every time he bent his elbow, but he couldn’t tell if the substance smeared over it was dried blood or mud. He expected the worst. At least neither arm appeared to be broken, but they still felt too weak to lift a rock, let alone heft the stones out of his way to find fresh air.

His arms, though, weren’t the primary source of his pain. The more firm his grasp on consciousness became, the more able he was to compartmentalize his pain and pinpoint where it came from. A huge, stabbing monster of it came from his left knee, which he turned his attention to with dread. It was hard to see exactly what had happened because his air bubble ended around his thighs and his legs were covered in debris. His right leg lay under stone blocks just heavy enough to pin it down and undoubtedly leave some bruises, but there was something else pinpointing the pain in his left knee.

Yuri blindly reached for it and felt hot warm blood soaking his pant leg around the knee. Then his fingers landed on some kind of metal bar. He slid his fingers down it until they reached the bloody patch where the bar had impaled itself into his leg. He hesitantly slid his hand around to the underside of his knee and confirmed the worst: it went all the way through. No wonder this was the epicentre of pain from which every other bruise and scrape radiated.

Instinct drove Yuri to grasp the bar - which he now guessed was one of the railings from the balcony - and try to yank it out. It was held down by the weight of rubble above it, even if his hands weren’t too slippery with blood to grasp it. As the initial panic wore off, Yuri realized this was for the best. As long as he was stuck here, all pulling it out would do was speed up the rate at which he lost blood. He’d already lost too much from his arm before the disaster.

He couldn’t move. There was no way he had the strength to lift any of the debris around him, and even if he could find a path to crawl out, his leg kept him pinned in place. Rescue was the only hope he had, but there was no way to guess how long that could take. Estelle and Repede would be looking for him… assuming they were unhurt.

What if they were in just as much of a pickle as he was? They’d been standing next to the house when it collapsed. Even if they’d avoided the wreckage of the house, he could only assume there had been more chaos throughout the village. The earthquake would have been everywhere, and there might have been even more danger. It had said it would raze the village to the ground if the sacrifice was denied, and shaking the earth might not have been its only form of attack. His fear for his friends was almost enough to overpower the pain keeping him motionless on the ground. He felt the urge to sit up and force the debris away, pain be damned, in order to help Estelle and Repede. Then, a small motion in his leg kicked off another wave of agony and, in the privacy of the rubble, he let himself channel some of it out in a moan.

He felt himself slipping toward unconsciousness again and had just enough energy to whisper, “Fuck.”

* * *

The small amount of light had faded into pure blackness. This told Yuri night must have fallen, but he was surprised it had only been one day. Time had oozed by today, just like the blood oozing from his knee. Yuri had spent the day drifting in and out of consciousness, equally unable to fall into a deep sleep or pull himself fully awake. His head throbbed and spun with dizziness every time he shifted it from side to side. Was that dehydration or blood loss? Perhaps a bit of both.

Through all the pain, one of the only thoughts Yuri could focus on was: I deserve this. This was his punishment for trying to run away. They’d been so stupid to think they could fix things in Yewbrooke and make it so that nobody had to die. Yuri had thought he had already reached the lowest depths of cynicism, but now he realized he’d still been blindly optimistic that surely the world couldn’t be this bad. Surely there was a way to solve the situation in Yewbrooke without killing anyone.

There wasn’t. The rotten village had been right all along. Either they kill one person a year, or the whole village suffers. He really was such a hypocrite. He’d told Christabel that when life handed you lemons, you just had to shut up and deal with them because they were still your lemons. Well, he hadn’t done that. It wasn’t the least bit fair that he had been forced into participating in their ceremony, but fair or not, those were the lemons he’d been given. And what had he done them? Tried to run away and pass the lemons off to the rest of the community to take the brunt of the Crukh’s wrath. It wasn’t fair that he had to die for them, but that didn’t give him the right to save his own life and let all these other people - many of them children and babies - die.

Yuri wanted to be rescued, but he really didn’t deserve it. He’d been willing to sacrifice everyone who suffered from the loss of blastia in order to save thousands more, but he hadn’t been willing to put his own life on the line. What a hypocritical piece of shit.

Something above him shifted. Yuri snapped back to attention when he heard a voice. Stone scraped on stone and a muffled male voice said something he couldn’t quite make out. People were above him! Yuri tried to shout to get their attention, but he didn’t have the strength to do more than groan. He tried pushing debris around him to create movement, but could barely lift his arms.

Rubble shifted, causing the bar in his knee to wobble. Yuri hissed and squeezed his eyes tight as fresh pain shot through it. The voices got louder, Yuri’s hope rose, and then weight came down on the stone block above the bar in his knee, shoving it further down. He felt something tear and the shock of agony gave him enough strength to yell, “Hey!”

“Someone’s down there!”

Yes! They were coming. He may not deserve this, but rescue was on its way. Estelle’s healing artes would be here soon and then he could finally not be in pain.

Yuri listened to debris shifting and getting tossed aside. After spending an entire day lying there, the last few minutes felt like eternity. Then, finally, the large slab that was propped over his head and torso, creating the pocket that saved him from getting crushed, was shoved aside and lantern light blazed above him.

“It’s him!” a man behind the lantern shouted.

His companion, who stood on the rubble over Yuri’s legs and was responsible for the shifts in pressure on Yuri’s knee, said, “Is he still alive?”

Yuri grunted in response and started trying to sit up.

“Looks like it,” lantern man said.

“What a pity. I’d hoped the Crukh got him. Just leave him - looks like he’s close to dead anyway.”

Yuri’s attempt at swearing at them came out as a groan.

“You’re probably right,” lantern man said. “But I’d feel guilty leaving him to die.”

“Why? He tried to do that to us.”

Lantern man left the lantern on a block and crawled down so his feet were next to Yuri’s head. “Because we’re better than him. Help me drag him out.” He grabbed Yuri under the armpits, dragged, and almost immediately hit resistance from the bar in Yuri’s knee. The pain spiked when he tried again, trying to force Yuri past the obstruction.

“S-stop!” Yuri managed to yell. “My leg….”

The companion had helpfully moved off Yuri’s legs and picked up the lantern to shine on the obstruction. For the first time, Yuri had a well-lit look at his knee and cringed at the mess of blood.

“Shit,” the one holding Yuri said. “We’re going to have to yank that out.”

“He’ll bleed out,” his companion said. “Look at him. He’s white as a sheet already. I’m surprised he’s not dead yet. You yank that out, and he’s a goner.” He didn’t sound overly concerned about this.

“Huh. You’re right. Let’s go find that pink-haired girl who’s been healing folks - she can close the wound up quick, I bet.”

“If you insist.”

The charitable man walked away, but his angry companion hopped off the pile to land next to Yuri. The lantern, left behind to mark Yuri’s position, shone on a face twisted with hatred. The man looked to Yuri’s bloody mess of a knee and then pushed down on the pile above it. The bar sank deeper into the damp ground and blood bubbled up around the edge. Yuri gasped and instinctively flung his arm at the man’s shins, but didn’t have the strength to do more than flop against it.

“Does that hurt, you piece of shit?”

Yuri just panted. It felt like a small sun had taken root within his knee and expelled waves of superheated pain.

“My wife is dead because of you, you fucking coward. My son hasn’t woken up yet. I don’t know why Cliff is so keen to save you - I say, the Crukh wanted you dead, so killing you is the best way to win his favour back.” He looked around the scene, then smirked as he said, “Wait right there.” He kicked Yuri’s shoulder and then climbed out of the debris.

Yuri fought with this tired brain for consciousness. He wasn’t so delirious that he couldn’t recognize a death threat. If the other man - Cliff - didn’t make it back with Estelle before this one returned, Yuri was going to be in a lot of trouble. He needed to get out of here.

Get up, idiot, he yelled at himself. With every ounce of strength he had left, and encouraged by the threat of imminent murder, Yuri dragged himself upright. He grabbed the pile of brick beside him to stabilize himself when his cotton-filled head immediately began to spin and whined about lying down again. All he had to do was hold himself together long enough to get out of here. He clutched the rubble holding the metal bar down and put as much muscle as he could into lifting it. He felt the metal shift and slide against the inside of his leg, but he’d only moved it less than a centimetre before the exertion became too much and he collapsed onto his back.

Damn it! He wanted to yell it, but couldn’t get his lungs to use that much air. All he’d done was make his leg hurt more than ever.

“Yuri!”

He opened his eyes and saw Christabel crouching on the rubble above him. Relief flooded through him. For the second time, he owed his life to Christabel. He wondered if that made up for the fact that his life had only been put in danger because of her in the first place.

“Cliff told me he found you. He’s gone to get Estelle and Repede.”

Voices and crunching footsteps announced the return of Cliff’s unfriendly companion, who had brought even unfriendlier companions of his own by the sound of things.

Christabel straightened up and began to say, “Oh, Morton, did you -” but then cut off in a yelp when Morton grabbed her arm and yanked her toward him.

“Lookie here, our little princess showed up, too.”

“Let go of me, Morton.”

A new voice, one of Morton’s friends who was out of Yuri’s view from the ground, said, “What d’ya figure? Does the Crukh want her or the outsider?”

“She was supposed to be the sacrifice,” a third man said. “We never should have tried to switch. If we’d just given him Christabel like he picked out last summer, none of this would have happened.”

“We did switch, though,” Morton said, still gripping Christabel firmly. “So maybe he wanted the outsider after all?”

“Better safe than sorry,” one of the others said. “I say we throw both of them across the river and let him have whichever he wants.”

Morton glowered at Christabel. “We’re better off killing them ourselves. We can’t risk ‘em running away again if we try to leave them to the Crukh. Throw ‘em into a fire like a normal mealtime sacrifice. Or just slit their throats.”

Yuri needed to get up. Morton had a knife and Christabel was struggling to escape his grip. After so many panic attacks over false alarms that he or someone else were about to be killed, he was finally in a situation where that was actually going to happen and there was nothing he could do about it. He tried to free his leg again, setting of a flash of pain that made his vision black out for a second.

“Holy Lance!” A blast of golden light rocked the rubble pile and Morton let go of Christabel to fall back.

A snarl and a bark came a second before Repede lunged past Christabel and snapped at Morton. He stopped, teeth barred, tense and ready to spring.

“Stay away from them!” Estelle arrived, clambering over the pile of rubble, just behind Repede.

“Those two are the cause of all this!” one of Morton’s friends shouted, pointing an accusatory finger at Christabel. The three men hung back, warily watching Repede.

“So what? That doesn’t give you any right to kill them! Killing them now won’t change what happened! It won’t bring back anyone who died! They don’t deserve to die now just because it might have helped earlier!”

Cliff, slightly calmer but also angry, spoke up from behind Estelle. “Simmer down, Mort. The girl’s right - killing these kids isn’t going to bring your wife back. I’m sorry.”

“Maybe not, but it would damn well make me feel better.” He jabbed a finger at Christabel. “Watch yourself, little princess. You won’t have a dog and a light show around all the time. You and that outsider were marked for the Crukh, and he’s just proven that he wants what he’s owed.” Morton gave the block over Yuri’s knee one last agonizing kick and then left with his friends.

“Oh, Yuri!” Estelle dropped to him, but Repede reached him first.

Estelle knelt while Repede whined anxiously and licked the side of Yuri’s face. The fact that Yuri wasn’t laughing and trying to bat Repede’s nose away while assuring him he was fine only set off more worried growls.

Yuri felt fingers at the side of his neck. He grunted, “I’m alive.”

“Oh thank goodness.” Estelle rubbed his shoulder. “Let’s get you out of here. Mr. Clifford, please help me lift the debris over his legs. We’ll do the bar last.”

Months ago, Yuri had run away with a naive little girl who didn’t know the first thing about surviving outside of the castle. He’d assigned himself as her protector, and watched out for her like an older brother. The him from months ago would have been shocked at the way Yuri closed his eyes and stopped fighting for consciousness, because as long as Estelle was here, he trusted the situation was under control.

Consciousness erupted back into him when the agony in his knee reached new excruciating levels. He had no strength to scream, but managed a hoarse wheeze as Cliff yanked the metal bar out of his leg. It left with a squelch that was equal parts physical and audible. Estelle cast a healing art immediately, but that did little to dampen the pain. He felt himself grabbed under the arms and lifted up to a waiting stretcher.

Estelle grasped one of his hands over his chest and squeezed. “You’re going to be ok, Yuri. I’ve got you.”

“I don’t know what to do,” Christabel moaned. “Morton will come back as soon as we fall asleep, and I doubt he’s the only one in the village who feels that way.”

Estelle squeezed a little tighter. “Considering how some people have been looking at us today, I think you’re right.”

Yuri mumbled, “We should go.”

“Go?” Christabel asked. “Where?”

But Yuri was too tired to say anything else, and trusted Estelle to understand him.

“Yuri is right,” Estelle said quietly. “We’re not safe here. We need to leave Yewbrooke, immediately.”

“You’d leave at night?” Cliff was incredulous. “But the forest is full of monsters.”

“The people here will try to kill us, too. I’m more used to monsters.” Estelle took a deep breath and stood up. “Repede and I are taking Yuri back to Zaphias immediately. Christabel, I really think you should come, too.”

Cliff said, “She’s right, Christabel. Sorry to say, but I don’t know how safe you are here.”

Christabel spoke slowly. “I… you’re right. Morton proved that. I’ve never left Yewbrooke, but I suppose there’s nothing here for me now, anyway.”

She and Estelle picked up opposite ends of Yuri’s stretcher and carried him away from the wreckage of the great house. As they went, Yuri gave up trying to stay conscious. He slipped into darkness content in the knowledge that the next time he woke up, he would finally be away from this awful village.


	11. Choices

Flynn Scifo was tired. That was turning out to be his standard state these days, though. Maybe the sheer amount of paperwork and meetings required of the commandant was what had driven Alexei mad.

Flynn returned to his office and slumped into his chair. It was past dinner time, but he’d eaten a muffin between meeting with the officer in charge of equipment delegation and meeting with the budgeting committee of the Council, which was basically the same thing as stopping for dinner. His bedroom was calling, but he had a pile of paperwork to get through that his meetings had interrupted, and he wanted to at least get started on it to make tomorrow more bearable.

He had just picked up his pen when Sodia knocked once and entered. She had to catch her breath from running to get here and then said, “Sir. Princess Estellise has returned to the castle.”

Flynn dropped the pen. “Is she ok? Is Yuri with her?” Flynn’s anger at his friends for running off had faded days ago, and all he was left with now was worry. He’d told himself over and over that Estelle had more than proved herself to be capable out in the world, that surely this mission couldn’t be more dangerous than anything they’d faced before, and that there was no one Flynn trusted to look out for her more than Yuri and Repede.

Still… Yuri had denied it, but it was obvious he had been feeling out of sorts. Estelle hadn’t been quite herself since they got back either, and the events at Midbell had shaken her. Flynn wanted to trust that his friends were capable and resilient, but because they were his dear friends, he also worried that neither of them had been entirely in the right frame of mind to go charging into danger. The longer it took for them to return, the more he worried.

“Lady Estellise is uninjured. Yuri Lowell is with her and was taken to the infirmary. They also brought a young woman back with them. Your dog is with her and fine as well.”

Flynn was split between relief for Estelle and worry for Yuri. There was no energy left for confusion over the young woman they’d brought. On his way out the office door, he said, “I’ll be in the infirmary if you need me.”

Despite his exhaustion, Flynn walked as quickly as he could. He arrived to see a nurse struggling to close the infirmary door on a growling and insistent Repede. When Flynn got close enough, he called, “Repede! Calm down.”

Repede turned to Flynn and barked in agitation. At the door, the nurse said, “Sir! This aggressive animal keeps trying to get into the infirmary.”

“Let him in,” Flynn said, one hand on Repede’s neck for comfort. Whether it was to comfort Repede or himself, he hadn’t decided.

“But-”

“He’s with me. If you just let him in, he’ll calm down. Now, where is Yuri Lowell?”

She opened the door and Repede shot inside. They passed through a small office and waiting area and then were led to a hallway and another door, which Flynn felt were far too many doors between him and knowing how badly Yuri was hurt. The final room was small and had only a bed, a few chairs, and a table. Yuri lay on the bed, and Estelle sat in one of the chairs. She wore a nurse’s uniform, but her face was streaked with dirt, her hair was a mess, and mud was caked on on her legs. She had clearly not stopped to shower before coming here, and Flynn imagined a nurse insisting she at least put on a clean dress until she could get properly cleaned up.

Repede wasted no time in running to Yuri’s side, giving him a sniff and licking the hand lying on a sheet, and then curled up on the floor by the bed as a sentinel. Flynn stood next to Estelle, looking down at his friend’s white face. Yuri was asleep, but didn’t look restful. He was as pale as the sheets around him, which only made the purple bruises over his arms and face stand out more harshly. There was a bandage around his left arm, and the blanket kept him from seeing what else had happened to him.

Estelle spoke up with a small, miserable voice. “Go ahead and say it.”

“Say what?”

“That you told me so. That we should have listened to you about it being a trap.”

Flynn’s last remaining hope that this had been a monster attack on the way home and they had otherwise returned with good news drained and he sank into the chair beside her. “I won’t say it. Will you tell me what happened?”

Flynn had been expecting a story about being ambushed by enemies of the Empire in the woods, and perhaps a harrowing journey home to account for how long they had been away. The story that spilled out of Estelle in bursts and sighs left him baffled.

“So we decided to leave right away,” Estelle said at the end of her lengthy tale. “We were so afraid that more angry villagers would come back in the night and try to hurt Yuri. Christabel and I walked all night through the woods, and was camped in the field around dawn. We only ran into a few monsters on the way back, so we’re fine.”

“Has Yuri been unconscious since you left the village?” Flynn had been staring at Estelle for most of the story, and now turned his attention back to Yuri.

“Almost. He’s woken up a few times so we were able to get some water into him.”

“Has he been seen by a doctor yet?”

She nodded. “Yes, I made sure that happened the moment we got back. The doctor said Yuri is going to be ok, he just needs to recover from losing a lot of blood.”

“What about his leg? You said it was badly injured.”

Estelle sighed heavily and shrugged. “It’s recovering. He’s stable, just… exhausted.”

Flynn surveyed Yuri and took a moment to process everything Estelle had said. “It could have been worse.”

“A lot of people died.”

Flynn let her statement hang. She clearly wasn’t in the mood to be comforted.

“Do you think we did something horrible, Flynn? I just wanted to save Yuri, but now all those people are hurt or worse.”

Flynn wished he was back in a meeting with the Council, because even that would be less stressful than this conversation. As much as he wanted to reassure her that everything was ok, she deserved his honest opinion. “I think… you did the best you could with the information you had. I’m also selfishly glad that you and Yuri came home safely, no matter what else happened. As for if it was right or wrong… I think you’d need to take that up with a philosopher. I really don’t know.”

“I see. Thank you, Flynn, for being honest.”

“What about the young lady who accompanied you back to Zaphias? Christabel? Where is she?”

“She’s in a guest room. Are you going to talk to her?”

“I would like to.”

“Please don’t be cruel to her.”

“Why would I be cruel to her?”

Estelle look at him. “Well… because she lured me and Yuri to her village and tried to get Yuri killed.”

“That… is why I’m upset with her, yes.”

“I’m angry with her, too,” Estelle said. “But she did try to help us in the end, and her choice got a lot of her friends killed, so… please be kind.”

It was hard for Flynn to look at Yuri half-dead and agree to be kind to the person responsible for putting him there. “I’ll do my best.”

Flynn left Estelle with Yuri and made his way to Christabel’s room. All the way there, he reminded himself over and over to try to be kind to the girl. He kept thinking about Yuri and then getting mad all over again.

At he door, he knocked and waited for her to open it. When she did, she remained in her doorway, which was just as well because Flynn didn’t think it would be appropriate to meet privately in her bedroom. “Good evening. I’m Commandant Flynn Scifo; I believe you know of me?”

“Yes. You’re friends with Yuri and Estelle?” Her voice was hesitant and she looked read to shut the door and run.

“That’s correct. I’m also the person you addressed your letter to. The one you intended to come to Yewbrooke.” Ok, that had maybe been a little mean. Estelle was right; Christabel was clearly shaken up and, no matter what role she played in Yuri’s injuries, she was still a teenager who had just witnessed her home town reduced to rubble.

Christabel winced. “I - I’m so sorry. I know that I shouldn’t have, I just -”

Flynn held up a hand. “Don’t bother apologizing. Lady Estellise has told me everything - I know you are remorseful. I didn’t come here to yell at you. I simply want to know what your intentions are in Zaphias.”

“My… intentions?”

“The safety of the castle and its inhabitants are my responsibility. Obviously I cannot allow a stranger to take up residence here without knowing anything about them. How long do you intend to stay?”

“I really don’t know. I don’t think I can ever go back to Yewbrooke. Estelle said I could come here, but if you don’t want me here, I can find somewhere else to go.”

Flynn sighed. He didn’t like the girl, but he could not in good consciousness kick a sixteen-year-old out on the streets with no money, no family, and no idea how the world worked outside of her idyllic village. “The castle has plenty of room for another guest. You can stay here as long as you need, but I encourage you to look into ways to earn money and establish a life independently.”

“Yes, of course, I can do that. Thank you for letting me stay, even though I… well….”

Tried to get my best friend killed? Flynn thought bitterly. “I haven’t forgotten what you’ve done. If you ever give me reason to believe you pose a risk to anyone in this castle-”

“Absolutely not.” She shook her had vigorously.

“Good. Now, what about the rest of your village? Do you think any of them pose a threat to the Empire?”

“No, I can’t imagine any of them would. They want nothing to do with the outside world.”

“I hope you’re right. Now, pardon my interruption, I’ll let you return to your evening.”

Flynn left, and briefly considered going back to his office to finish his work. Then he tried to imagine concentrating on anything else tonight, and headed for his bedroom instead.

* * *

The next few weeks droned on for Yuri. At first, there had been things to do. Flynn wanted to hear his account of what happened, Estelle was busy in the library to see if there was any record of Yewbrooke or the Crukh in history books, and Christabel wandered the halls, learning about the outside world bit by bit. Yuri had to spend the first few days in the infirmary, where the only thing he could do was write to Brave Vesperia to fill them in on what had happened. He’d had a few days of stress and fear that had felt like the old days, but now it was over and that left a chasm more vacant than before. He felt like a hammer who couldn’t find any nails.

Despite his hopes, getting released from the infirmary didn’t help with this. He may no longer need constant bed rest, but his knee was far from healed and he would be crutches for at least a few more weeks. Karol had written back to say they would return to Zaphias as soon as they could and they he wished Yuri a speedy recovery, and Yuri hated to think that it was just as well they weren’t rushing back because it wasn’t as if he could run out on a mission with Brave Vesperia anyway.

Almost a month after they returned from the forest, Yuri was making his way down the corridor. Repede walked based him, occasionally going too far ahead and then stopping for him to catch up. He had been spending a lot of time with Yuri lately, and Yuri wondered if Repede was feeling particularly protective after everything that had happened, or just because Yuri was temporarily disabled.

“Wait here,” Yuri said one he arrived at the infirmary. Estelle had said Repede was allowed inside the night they got back because Flynn had demanded it, but without the commandant’s weight to throw around, nurses got stubborn about letting dogs into the infirmary. Repede huffed and lay on the floor by the door, watching Yuri carefully as he went in. Inside, Yuri was shown to the doctor’s office and told to sit and wait. Yuri took a seat gratefully; after hopping all the way down here, his knee hurt even more than usual. His leg, splinted at the knee and unable to bend, stuck out in front of him.

As he waited, Yuri massaged the outside of the splint as if it would actually help. He used to think that you could get used to any amount of pain after while, but his knee was putting that to the test. Somehow, three weeks later, the level of pain didn’t seem to have diminished at all. Lemon gels only took the edge off for an hour or two. Today the doctor was going to check on its progress, and hopefully tell him how much longer it was going to be like this.

Everything else was healing without problems. He had a wicked scar on his arm that he was sure would lead to some great stories about being ritually sacrificed to a ancient forest deity once he felt able to talk about their experience in Yewbrooke without triggering his anxiety. The bruises were fading, cuts had gone to scabs and then to faint red lines, and Estelle said he had pink in his cheeks again to avoid looking like a walking corpse. If not for this damn knee, he’d have started going on missions with Karol, Judith, and Repede again.

Sitting around the castle while his friend carried out missions made him feel like shit. Karol said it was his punishment for running off without telling them, but he still felt like a bad guild member for doing nothing while they worked. Maybe if he’d been able to relax these past few weeks and stop worrying about whether his friends were ok, his knee would have healed faster.

The door opened and the doctor, a man called Carrow, joined him. “Good afternoon, Mr. Lowell. How is your knee treating you today?”

“Like an unwanted stepchild.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.” He dragged his chair close to Yuri so he could reach it. “I’m going to take the splint off and see what’s going on. This shouldn’t hurt.”

As Yuri had anticipated, the doctor saying it wouldn’t hurt meant that it hurt just enough to notice but not enough to complain about. His knee already hurt so much all the damn time, that the additional pain didn’t faze him. Carrow rubbing his thumb over Yuri’s knee cap and prodding the side of it did faze him, though, and he reflexively pulled it away with a hiss.

“Sorry. I’m finished.” He pulled his hands away.

Yuri rested a hand protectively over the knee as he relished sitting with it bent for the first time in weeks. “So can the splint stay off?”

“I think it’s done all it can to promote recovery, yes.”

“Glad to hear it.”

“However….”

Yuri hated the way the doctor hesitated. Carrow cleared his throat and that was enough time for Yuri to run through every possible complication he could think of, all of which ended in his death. Somehow, a few of those worst-case-scenarios also resulted in Estelle or Flynn’s deaths.

“We need to talk about the long-term prognosis for your knee.”

“Ok….”

“Simply put, I doubt it will get much better than this.”

Yuri frowned. “What do you mean? It’s barely even started healing.”

“It has healed,” Carrow said. “The healing artes from Lady Estellise, and the lemon gels you’ve eaten, have, over the past month, successfully stopped the internal bleeding and stabilized the knee. With more time, not much more is going to change.”

Yuri tried to remain calm, but it was hard with a fire in his knee taking up a lot of his attention. “If it’s healed, why does it still hurt?”

“Ligaments are not muscle, I’m afraid. They don’t just neatly knit together again after being torn. The knee is a very delicate and intricate joint, and the bar that pierced yours did a lot of damage. Those ligaments will not re-attach to the bones.”

“You can fix that though, right?”

Carrow did another of those damn hesitations that told Yuri the news was not going to be uplifting. “It is possible that, with extensive surgeries over a number a years, we may be able to lessen the chronic pain and achieve minimal weight-bearing capacity.”

Yuri’s head spun as if he was low on blood again. Surely he’d heard wrong. The deal with medicine was supposed to be that if you went through complicated treatment, you came out of it perfectly healed in the end. He didn’t want the pain in his knee lessened, he wanted it gone. “What exactly do you mean by ‘minimal weight-bearing’?”

“With significant physical therapy, you might be able to walk with a cane rather than crutches.”

Yuri realized he was slowly shaking his head. This wasn’t right. He was supposed to put up with pain and crutches for a few weeks to a few months before healing and going back to normal. He was supposed to have a bad scar and maybe a knee that was a bit stiff and a harrowing story to tell ten years from now. He was supposed to be joining Brave Vesperia on their missions within a couple of months, but how was that going to happen if his best option was to maybe walk with a cane several years from now? This could not be his future.

“We should also discuss your other option.”

Yuri snapped out of his daze at those words. Yes! Of course there was another option. The world may be shitty, but it couldn’t be this cruel.

Carrow said, “There is always the option of amputation.”

Yuri’s hopes crashed and burned. “Amputation? What? What do you mean that’s an option? That’s a last resort.”

“Normally, yes. But as I said, it’s an option. Your knee is not infected, and the limb below it is healthy. It isn’t harmful to keep your leg. However, it is likely the only long-term and permanent solution to your pain.”

Yuri had made it to the infirmary, right? He was with the doctor? This sounded like a joke. “You’re saying that in your professional medical opinion, the best way to fix a sore knee is to… cut it off?”

“Quite simply, yes. Even with extensive surgical revision and all the healing artes Lady Estellise can give you, your knee is going to hurt. The last time we met, you said it was at about a level seven out of ten? With surgical intervention, the best we could achieve is maybe a four or a five.”

“I’m not cutting my leg off. I’m very attached to it.”

“It is, of course, entirely your decision and I encourage you to take as much time as you need to think about it. As I said, your leg is not in any immediate danger. However, you might decide that, since you are unable to walk with it anyway, you might be better served by replacing it with a prosthesis and learning to walk with that.”

“What, exactly, would that entail?” Yuri held up a finger. “Not that I’m saying this is a good idea.”

Carrow smiled gently. “Of course not. If you did choose to pursue this, however, we would amputate it above the knee, around the mid-thigh. It would be remiss of me not to mention that amputation is not a simple surgery and there are always risks of complications, such as infection. It would take around a month for the stump to fully heal, and then you can be fitted with a prosthesis and begin physical therapy. If everything goes well, you could probably expect to walk unassisted within a year.”

“And that’s the only way to stop being in pain?”

“Yes… although you need to know that amputation comes with pain of its own. The recovery is not simple, you could expect the stump to ache every now and then, and there’s always the risk of phantom limb pain. However, in my opinion, it is likely to be less pain than keeping the leg.”

Yuri absently ran his fingers over his knee. He felt like he’d dropped through the ice and into an ocean of terrible news that he hadn’t even realized was beneath his feet. There was no stable ground he could land on to orient his thoughts. “And what happens if, two years from now, I’ve gone ahead with chucking my leg and you announce that you’ve had a medical breakthrough and can now fix the problem in my knee?”

Carrow shrugged sympathetically. “I’m afraid that’s a risk you have to weigh when making your decision.”

“So these are my only options, huh? Throw out my leg and suffer, or live with horrible pain for the rest of my life and suffer? What’s the third option?”

“There isn’t one. You can either choose to live with your knee and the pain it brings, or get rid of it.”

“Fantastic.”

“Don’t make your decision today. This is something you should spend a good amount of time considering. Discuss it with your loved ones and decide what would be best for you and your life.”

“Right. Yeah.”

Yuri left the office with his head still spinning. He barely noticed Repede rising and falling into sync beside him. His attention focused on the click of the crutches on the stone floors, and then the prospect of hearing that click every day for the rest of his life reared its terrifying head and threatened to crush him under its weight.

It just couldn’t be real. He’d had a lot of nightmares lately, and surely this was one of them. Repede whined and bumped his cold nose against Yuri’s hand. He knew Yuri was upset and he obviously wanted to help, but at the moment, Yuri didn’t want to be grounded in reality. He wanted to believe that any moment now he would wake up and shake the conversation with the doctor off as a worst-case scenario cooked up by a mind anxious about healing.

This couldn’t be. How was he supposed to wield a sword on crutches? He couldn’t protect his friends if his knee never healed. They might get hurt and there would be nothing he could do to help them. Familiar dread began to creep into his mind, which only made him feel worse. Yuri wanted to fight it off, but he couldn’t lift his mind past the weight of the decision thrust upon him.

Should he risk amputation and trust that he would eventually be better off? The thought of that made his heart beat faster. Or hope for a better option to come along and deal with the pain and the crutches indefinitely? A throb of pain in his knee forced him to stop and take a deep breath. His hands were shaking and it was getting harder to breathe.

Repede growled and gently took hold of Yuri’s belt in his mouth. Yuri looked down in surprise as Repede tugged at him. He momentarily balanced on his good leg so he could rub Repede’s head. As his fingers curled through the fur, Repede felt like the only real thing in the world.

He couldn’t keep standing here, exposed and vulnerable in a hallway that had never seemed so cavernous. It felt like he was straining against a door in his brain that was already bulging with the flood of panic that would inevitably sweep over him. He couldn’t do this, not here, and then Repede was pulling at him and he had to scramble to grab his crutch again so he could follow. Only half-aware of what was happening, Yuri let Repede drag him down the hallway. His mind was focused on the fight to hold together and he didn’t have the energy to spare on navigation.

Then the damn broke and he couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t tell where he was or what he was doing. Yuri stumbled, his knee burned and he thought it was going to kill him right then. It might as well, because it would kill him eventually, or one of his friends, because he couldn’t fight and couldn’t protect them and disaster was looming and he was breathing so hard but not getting any oxygen and -

He was sitting on a soft chair, Repede’s head in his lap and taking deep breaths. Yuri stroked Repede’s fur and focused on his warmth and calm breathing. It didn’t make the sea of panic go away, but it gave him an anchor to hold onto until it faded.

When Yuri at least began to be able to think clearly again, and sat up straight while keeping on hand still on Repede. Looking around, Yuri realized they were in a small sitting room with ornate sofas and an ornate coffee table no doubt worth more than the average lower quarter house. He felt beat, like he’d sprinted a mile to get here and his knee ached in the background. Despite that, he had to smile at Repede.

“You were listening when I told Estelle she could help me get somewhere private to sit it out, huh?”

Repede just licked his hand.

For the first time since these attacks started, Yuri saw a glimmer of hope. The dread of fearing one would strike at an inopportune time was almost as bad as experiencing the crippling terror itself. If Repede was with him though, then no matter where he was when it happened, he would have someone who knew what was happening and could help him get away from other people and wait to calm down, even when his brain wasn’t thinking right.

“Can you do this for me?” Yuri rubbed behind Repede’s ear. “Help me out when my brain collapses?”

Repede gave him a small woof in reply.

“Thanks.” Yuri refused to be a burden on his friends, but Repede was different. They had been partners for a long time. He wished he could just delete the part of his brain that kept freaking out, but if he knew Repede would be around to help, well, it was a start. “Now I just need to figure out what to do with my leg. I don’t suppose you can help me decide?”

Repede sat back and looked at him curiously.

“Yeah. Didn’t think so.” Yuri sighed. “Guess I’m gonna have to do a lot of thinking.”

* * *

Estelle was the one who suggested the outing to the market, but she wasn’t enjoying it anymore than Christabel. She’d thought getting out of the castle and into the buzz of the city would do them both some good. Instead, the bustle of people chatting and laughing casually only served to make Estelle feel more alone. All her worries and fears stood like a wall between her and the rest of society.

Yewbrooke had begun to join Midbell in her nightmares. She had spent her life defining herself as a healer, so why did she keep causing so much death and injury? Flynn’s words to her the night they’d arrived back in Zaphias kept running through her mind over and over.

You did the best you could with the information you had.

That wasn’t the same as ‘you did the right thing.’ Even now, more than a month later, she still couldn’t figure out what the ‘right thing’ had been. Allowing all those people in the village to die couldn’t possibly be the right thing, but she couldn’t bring herself to believe that letting Yuri be killed could ever be the right thing to do, either. From the way Christabel had been wandering around the castle in a daze, barely eating and responding to conversation even less, she seemed to be caught up in the same dilemma.

Plus, as of last week, Estelle had something new to worry about. Yuri had gone to see the doctor and get the splint off of his leg, and Estelle had expected him to be thrilled afterwards. She’d gone to visit him with a cake to celebrate his recovery, but Yuri had barely touched his slice and spent the whole visit spacing out whenever she talked. Something must have happened to sour his spirits, but he insisted nothing was wrong in that Yuri way of his that said something serious was very wrong indeed. Yuri would keep it hidden out of sight as long as possible, and all she could do was hope he brought it up before it started to smell.

Now she and Christabel were at the market, trying their best to fit in with everyday life but failing miserably. A cluster of people around a vegetable stall moved away, and suddenly Estelle and Christabel came face to face with a familiar person. Estelle froze, certain she was simply seeing a similarity on a stranger, but Christabel was more confident.

“Gideon?”

“Huh. Fancy seeing you ladies here.” The man had a paper bag of groceries in one arm and his ever-present scowl on his face.

“Um, what are you doing here?” Estelle asked.

“Buying groceries.”

Christabel pushed, “But why are you in Zaphias?” Frightened now, she asked, “Is anyone else here?”

Gideon chuckled. “Nah, I didn’t lead a pack of vigilantes here for you blood or anything. I decided to move back here.”

“Why?” Estelle asked. “I thought you’d already tried Zaphias and decided you hated it?”

Gideon shrugged. “Lost my house in the attack. I was thinking about rebuilding, but decided I didn’t like the idea of rebuilding my life in a place where a couple of kids with bleeding hearts could get my house destroyed.”

Estelle winced and Christabel look away with a taut breath.

“Besides. Things were getting pretty hectic in Yewbrooke when I left.”

“Hectic how?” Estelle asked.

“There’s a big argument about what to do. They can’t decide if they should sacrifice someone right away to make things up to the Crukh, or if it will be fine to leave it until next year. Some people believe we need to try to stick to tradition and try to go back to the normal as soon as possible and only sacrifice on the solstice. Bunch of others think we’re not going to get any protection from the Crukh until he gets a snack.”

“What does Mayor Gower think?” Christabel asked.

“Not much. He’s dead. Your pal Cliff is leading things now - y’know, the one who helped you out the night you left.”

Estelle nodded. “I remember him. Do you know which side is winning?”

“They were about even when I left. A couple die-hards are convinced that the Crukh will only be satisfied with either Christabel or Yuri, but none of them are brave enough to leave the forest to do anything about it, so I wouldn’t worry. Anyway, I’m off now. If you see me again, don’t say hi.”

Gideon, at least, didn’t seem to have changed after everything that had happened. When he was gone, Estelle turned to Christabel, who looked nauseated. “Christabel? Are you ok?”

“What if they’re right?” she whispered.

“Who?”

“The people like Morton. The ones who think the only way too bring back the blessing of the Crukh is to let it kill me.”

“They’re not,” Estelle said firmly. “Everyone already agreed it was safe to switch you out for Yuri, right?”

“I… I guess.”

“Come on.” She wrapped an arm around Christabel’s shoulders. “Let’s go home. Coming out here wasn’t as fun as I thought it would be.”


	12. Decisions

Yuri followed Flynn and Estelle back to the castle. Flynn had insisted that the three of them get out and have a nice dinner, and Yuri reluctantly agreed. Because he was still hopping around on crutches, they’d gone to a place nearby. This meant it had been more swanky than Yuri was comfortable with, and Flynn had insisted on Yuri wearing a buttoned-up shirt in a way that reminded Yuri uncomfortably of Yewbrooke.

Repede had come as well, as he’d rarely left Yuri’s side in the past week. Yuri didn’t want to go into detail about his mental health to Flynn, but Flynn had already figured out that something was up with him. That saved Yuri from having to go into specifics about feeling better when Repede was with him. Flynn understood, and had enough influence to demand the restaurant let Repede come in and sit under the table with them. Going anywhere without Repede now made Yuri more anxious than ever, but that was counterbalanced by how much better he felt when Repede was with him.

Estelle had almost seemed like her old self during dinner. At the very least, she’d been able to put her stress aside for the evening and laugh with Flynn. Yuri hadn’t been so lucky. On top of their old worries about the blastia, his ongoing anxiety, and their shared fear that they’d done something horrible in Yewbrooke, he also had spent a week and a half trying to decide what to do about his leg. As far as his friends knew, he was staying with Flynn and Estelle at the castle until his leg healed enough to rejoin Brave Vesperia. He hadn’t yet broken the news to anyone else that it might be a very long time before he was able to join them again.

At least the crutches gave him an excuse to lag behind the other two. Flynn and Estelle chatted about castle gossip that Yuri couldn’t bring himself to care about. Back inside the castle, Flynn invited both of them back to his apartment and Yuri reluctantly tagged along. Flynn’s place was still largely bare. He’d moved into the commandant’s suite, and so far had managed to purge it of everything belonging to Alexei, but hadn’t yet made it a home of his own. He and Estelle sat on a couch while Yuri tried to drown in the stuffing of a large armchair.

Halfway through a drink, Flynn turned to him. “Yuri, what is bothering you lately?”

“Huh?” Yuri forced himself out of imagining how he’d walk with a wooden leg. “Nothing.”

“Nonsense. You’ve been out of sorts since before you went to Yewbrooke, and have been worse since getting back. I understood that you needed time to bounce back after your ordeal, but now it’s getting worse. Ever since you got the splint off your knee, you’ve barely said a word. So, I’ll ask again: what’s bothering you lately?”

Estelle watched Yuri with intense concern and Yuri wondered if Estelle had put Flynn up to this. Then he felt guilty about suspecting his friend. Flynn was more than capable of fretting about Yuri on his own.

“You guys don’t need to worry about it.”

Estelle pouted. “It’s too late for that. We’re already worried. Yuri, please, we talked about this. Please tell us what’s bothering you so maybe we can help.”

Yuri idly massaged his knee. He wondered if Flynn and Estelle knew how constantly it hurt. Sure, they had seen him eat lemon gels a few times a day, but they probably thought he ate them only when the pain appeared, rather than only when the pain became so great he felt like lying on the floor and passing out. “There’s not really anything you can do to help with this.”

Flynn twisted on the cushion to more fully face Yuri. “Try us.”

Yuri hesitated, but Estelle had a point. They had talked about this, and he had agreed to be more open. “Alright. Try to help with this, then. According to the doc, my leg isn’t going to heal.”

Estelle looked confused. “But I used so many healing artes. Isn’t it healing? It’s already stopped being so purple and swollen.”

“Right. But apparently all the healing artes in the world can’t put it back together again. He gave me two choices: live with pain and a useless leg forever, or amputate it.”

Flynn grimaced. “Yuri… I had no idea. I’m so sorry.”

“But….” Estelle looked lost. “Those can’t be the only choices.”

“Forget it. I already tried my best to get a third option from the doctor, and it’s a no-go. So, that’s what I’ve been worrying about all week. Trying to decide if I want to keep my leg or not.”

Estelle pressed her hands to her mouth. “Oh… oh, Yuri….”

“Are you looking for advice?” Flynn asked.

Yuri shrugged. “Couldn’t hurt. I’ve been thinking about it for a week but I keep going around in circles.”

“Ok.” Flynn folded his hands and leaned forward. “Be honest - what level of pain are you talking about living with if you keep it?”

“It feels like there’s a knife embedded in there at all times. The doctor said we might be able to tone it down with surgery, but not that much.”

Flynn gave him a look of pity which was the reason Yuri hadn’t mentioned it before. “Yuri… you never mentioned. No wonder you’ve been out of sorts since you got back. But ok, thinking of it that way, it seems to me that if your choices are to live with that level of pain and not be able to walk, or to live with a different amount of pain but be able to walk with a prosthetic leg, that may be a… less bad option.”

“That’s what I was thinking, but I keep coming back to more doubt. At least how it is now, I know what I’m in for and it won’t get worse. Who knows what complications may come up if I get it amputated? And since we lost healing artes - except for Estelle - medicine in the next few years is going to go through a lot of changes. Maybe a few years from now, they’ll figure out how to fix what’s wrong with my knee and I’ll be kicking myself for lopping it off.”

“That will always be the case, though,” Estelle said. “Even if you wait a few years to see if anything changes, you’ll still be wondering if something might change even later.”

“Yeah, I know. That’s why I’m having trouble deciding what to do.” Yuri sighed and leaned back. Rubbing his knee wasn’t doing anything to help with the pain. “Just feels like I’ve had a lot of big decisions to make lately, and I don’t know if I chose right for any of them, and I’d rather not make another one.”

“I think….” Flynn slowly stirred his thoughts around as he put them in order. “I think, ultimately, you need to decide what you think will give you the best quality of life based on what you know now. Not to say that I know exactly how you feel, but sometimes I hit decisions like this with the Knights. Situations come up where I know that whatever I order, someone is going to get hurt. When I first became lieutenant and started having to make these sort of calls, I kept putting off decisions as long as I could in the hope that some third option would appear that wouldn’t hurt anybody. They never did. This is a very personal choice for you, and I won’t tell you what you should or shouldn’t do, but I don’t think it’s wise to base your decision on the idea that a third option will come along if you wait long enough.”

Yuri stared at his leg. He’d been looking for that third option ever since the doctor talked to him. There just had to be one because even with his rotten luck, life couldn’t be so unfair as to only give him two losing options. Yuri had thought he had reached the depths of cynicism long ago, but it turned out there was another, even deeper, layer of unfairness to the universe that he needed to accept. “And what happens if I pick bad option A, but later realize I really should have picked bad option B?”

“I’m afraid that’s just something you have to learn to live with,” Flynn said gently. “I find that it doesn’t help to dwell on things like this. Learn from them, but don’t blame yourself if you know you honestly did the best you could at the time. If you decide to amputate your leg, well… broadly speaking, it doesn’t really matter if it was the right or wrong decision, since you can’t change it at this point anyway. Worry more about how you’ll deal with the decisions you made than on if you regret them.”

“Ah. The good ol’ ‘life sucks sometimes, and you just gotta deal with that’ sentiment?”

“That’s a less elegant way of putting it, I suppose.”

“Alright. Thanks for the advice, honestly. Now, if you still want me to be honest, my leg is on fire and if I stick around much longer, I’m going to pass out in this chair.”

“Oh!” Estelle hopped up and hurried to him. “I’m sorry we kept you late. You should go back to your room and get some rest.” She held out her hand to help pull him up from the chair.

Yuri grabbed the crutches leaning on the chair, said goodnight to his friends, and hopped out of the room.

* * *

Yuri sat awake on the edge of his bed around midnight. It had been a nightmare that woke him - an old familiar staple about the Adephagos. It was nice to know that even with everything else going on in his life, these old classic fears and doubts had stuck by him. The dream was only what had woken him up, though, and that had been almost half an hour ago.

The pain was what kept him from going back to sleep. It wasn’t just his knee that hurt - that was the epicentre, but it spread up and down his leg like fiery tendrils. He’d tried to go back to sleep, but every time he closed his eyes and tried to relax, his brain drummed a rhythm of, it hurts, it hurts, it hurts. It made him want to punch the wall to get some tension out, and there were imprints in his palms from how aggressively he’d dug his nails into them to distract himself. Tonight’s pain was only a slight increase over the baseline amount of pain he’d dealt with every single day, every single hour, since Yewbrooke. Yuri honestly didn’t know if he could handle this for much longer.

He had a way out, though, didn’t he? All this pain was because his knee was screwed up, so getting rid of the knee would get rid of the pain.

Then his door creaked open and his heart nearly leapt out of his chest. Yuri rose on one foot and grabbed the sword that always stayed by his bed.

“Sorry.” It was just Flynn. “I should have knocked. I thought you were asleep.” Flynn entered with a candle for light. There was talk about installing new lighting in the castle now that blastia were gone, but it hadn’t happened yet. Flynn wore his uniform haphazardly and his hair was a disordered mess, giving the impression that he’d gotten dressed in a rush after being dragged from bed. “Why are you up?”

“Trouble sleeping.” Yuri sat on the bed again to avoid balancing on one leg. “What about you? What’s going on?” Flynn had clearly been woken up to attend to some knightly matter, and what it could be had Yuri’s mind racing with possibilities. “Is Estelle ok?”

“What? Yes, she’s fine, why wouldn’t she be?”

Yuri tried to shake that fear from his head. “Never mind. What’s up?”

“It’s the girl you brought back with you, Christabel. She was stopped trying to sneak out of the castle. Of course she’s free to leave, she isn’t a prisoner, but I thought her leaving in the middle of the night, with so few belongings in her bag, was suspicious. She won’t talk to me, so I hoped you could ask her what she was doing. She’s waiting in my office”

“Yeah, of course.” Yuri put down his sword and picked up his crutches. He hadn’t bothered changing out of pyjamas, but unlike Flynn, he didn’t have any knights to impress.

At his office, Flynn stopped and said, “Just… talk to her. Tell her she isn’t in trouble, I just want to know why she’s trying to sneak away in the middle of the night. If she wishes to leave, we can outfit her with travel supplies to leave in the morning, when it’s safe.”

Inside, Christabel was sitting at Flynn’s desk with her head hung and hands in her lap. She looked nervously over her should when she heard someone approach, but relaxed when she saw Yuri.

“Hey, Chris.” Yuri sat on Flynn’s desk and stretched his aching leg. “You know, when we ran away from Yewbrooke in the middle of the night, I thought it was just because people were trying to kill us. I didn’t know you meant to make it a habit.” When Christabel didn’t answer, Yuri went on. “Flynn wants you to know that you’re not in trouble or anything. You’re not under arrest and you can leave in the morning if you want. I’m pretty curious about where you plan to go, though.” Yuri took in her silence, her solemn expression, and the lack of packed bags. Since coming to Zaphias, she had acquired at least a few possessions, notably new clothes, but didn’t see fit to bring any of them on her midnight journey. She hadn’t intended to start a new life somewhere far away. Yuri sighed. “I thought you agreed that going back to Yewbrooke would be a bad idea.”

Christabel finally spoke up, though she didn’t move her eyes from her knees. “I wasn’t planning on going to the village. I was going to go across the river.”

Yuri stopped himself from swearing. “That’s even more stupid. It would have just killed you.”

Christabel stared at her knees.

Yuri’s heart sank and he felt like an idiot for pointing out something Christabel had not only known, but counted on.

“I was supposed to die,” she whispered. “The Crukh chose me. He wanted me, and I denied him, and Yewbrooke was destroyed. If I had just accepted my fate, then none of this would have happened.”

“So, what, you plan to run off and give yourself to the Crukh as an apology?”

“It might be the only way to bring back its blessing.”

Yuri shook his head. “If anyone needs to die for that, it’s me.” He jokingly pointed at her. “But don’t get any ideas, ok? Look, I’m the one who was supposed to die that night. The Crukh didn’t choose you - random chance did. You picked the bad bun. I don’t think we were all that wrong about what it is. It’s a manipulative bastard that wants to be worshipped and praised, and it wants you to live in fear of it. It isn’t like it needs the sacrifice to keep up its divine strength or anything.”

“You don’t know that for sure.”

“Sure I do. It would have been at its absolute lowest the night of the solstice, wouldn’t it? Right at the end of its cycle, it unleashed far more energy than ever before, raging for hours after it was supposed to be ‘recharged.’ That tells me it doesn’t really need the sacrifice - it just wants it. So I don’t believe there’s any magical mumbo-jumbo about chosen ones fated to die. This thing wants the village to sacrifice a person every year just because it can, and now that you’re not a member of the village, you sacrificing yourself on your own terms isn’t going to change it wanting someone from the village.”

Christabel frowned and looked up. “That… actually makes a lot of sense.”

“See? So it’s stupid to sacrifice yourself now. I’m sure the Crukh would love it, because it certainly seemed happy to try to get Estelle and I to do ourselves in when we went across the river, but it won’t help Yewbrooke.”

She rubbed her face with her fists. “What am I supposed to do, then? Everything that’s happened was my fault. Maybe me dying now wouldn’t help Yewbrooke, but don’t I still deserve to? I was supposed to sacrifice myself. If I had, you would never have been injured, the village would still be standing, and no one would have died.”

“You would have.” Yuri almost thought he should thank Estelle for giving him practice rounds with this exact conversation.

“That’s better than everyone else.”

Yuri shrugged. “You know what? Maybe it would have been. Maybe you should have just rolled over and died. Maybe trying to save yourself was immoral, and then maybe saving me was unethical in the grand scheme of things. But so what?”

“So what? More than a hundred people died. How can you say ‘so what’ when what we did hurt so many people? I was trying to do the right thing, but I screwed up.”

“Because let’s say you had decided to let me die that night. Imagine you stayed tucked in bed and listened to me scream when the Crukh did whatever it does, and the next day was a sunny and happy day in a peaceful village. You know what I think? You would still feel wretched. You’d be sitting there hating yourself for letting me die for you and maybe you’d feel so awful about it that you thought it would be keen to wade across the river and give yourself to the Crukh anyway to make up for it.”

“I… suppose so.”

“You can even back up even more. If you hadn’t invited me and Estelle, you’d have spent the last week in terror, feeling awful about dying soon, and then meet a horrible end. That would suck for you, and it would have been miserable for everyone in the village who cared about you and would have grieved your death. You invited us, though, so you got to live but instead you spent that week wracked with guilt and feeling horrible about betraying us. That sucked for you, too.”

“So you’re saying I was just doomed to be miserable?” She sounded almost angry now, which was at least better than morose.

“I’m saying that you got a lose-lose situation. You’ve been beating yourself up trying to figure out what the morally right thing to do was, and honestly? I don’t think there was one. Allowing an innocent person to suffer is never the morally right thing to do. That’s what I believe, anyway. I really thought we could solve the problem in Yewbrooke without letting any innocent people suffer, but it turns out that there isn’t always a third option to find where everyone can be happy.”

“What are we supposed to do, then?” She thumped her fits on her knees. “How do we do the right thing when the only available options are bad things?”

Yuri leaned back and looked to the ceiling. “We don’t, I guess. It seems to me that the only way to avoid screwing at least some people over in this game is to avoid playing altogether, and that’s not an option either. So just… do the best you can. Help people when you can. Sometimes you’re going to have to make a lose-lose decision, and whatever you choose, you’re going to want to beat yourself up over it, but that’s not going to help.”

The Adephagos rolled menacingly through Yuri’s mind. It almost surprised Yuri to discover that there was still an optimistic scrap in his brain that insisted there must have been another way to get rid of it without exposing so many people to the dangers of life without blastia. What were they supposed to do, though? Twiddle their thumbs until it came along? It might never have. He and Estelle had been beating themselves up for not finding the option where nobody got hurt, but Yuri was starting to believe that the world simply wasn’t kind enough to have had one available. Life could be crueler than even he had thought, and Yuri found that acceptance strangely comforting.

Yuri pushed himself off the desk, but still clutched it for balance. “You can’t spend the rest of your life worrying about decisions that are in the past. What happened, happened, and it’s too late to change anything. Worry more about the changes you still can make in the future. Well, that’s what Flynn said anyway, and he’s a pretty smart guy. Now, I’m exhausted, so do you think you’re ready to go back to bed?” He held out his hand.

She looked at it. “Basically, you’re saying that the world is miserable and cruel, and sometimes it’s impossible to do the right thing because all possible choices are bad in their own way, and that’s why I should stop feeling sad?”

“…Basically, yes.”

“Funnily enough, that actually does make me feel a bit better.”

* * *

Yuri lounged on Estelle’s bed wearing boxer shorts. She had insisted on being able to see the actual knee in order to use healing artes on it, and his pants weren’t loose enough to roll them all the way up to his thigh. Estelle sat on the side of the bed, hands hovering over his knee. Repede lay on the floor by the bed, at Yuri’s side as always.

The light faded with a knock on the door. “Just a second, Yuri, sorry.” She ran to the door and swung it open. “Oh! Good evening, Flynn!”

“Good evening, Lady Estellise, I -” he caught sight of Yuri, arms folded behind his head, wearing nothing but a t-shirt and boxers on the princess’ bed. “Am I… uh… interrupting something?”

Yuri lifted one hand. “Yo.”

Estelle looked confused, turned back to Yuri, pieced together what the scene might look like, and turned pinker than her hair. “No! Oh my goodness, no, Flynn, Yuri was just - it’s not like that at all! His leg was really bothering him, so I made him take his pants off so I could see it for healing.”

“Ah. Yes, of course, that makes sense.” Flynn looked like a man whose world had shifted off its axis and then been rapidly slammed back into place so quickly it left him dizzy. “It’s just as well that he’s here.” While he talked, Estelle grabbed his arm and dragged him into the room so that he continued from beside the bed. “I wanted to talk to both of you about Yewbrooke.”

Yuri pulled himself slightly more upright. He hadn’t thought about Yewbrooke much since talking to Christabel the other night. “What about it?”

“I just had a meeting with His Majesty about it. We’ve confirmed that according to Imperial law, the village is located within the Empire’s territory and they are therefore subject to Imperial law. As you can imagine, Imperial law does not look kindly on ritual human sacrifice.”

“You want to lead knights in?” Estelle had returned to her seat on the bed.

“That’s what I wanted to talk to you two about. Ioder is worried that while he doesn’t like what they’re doing, the world is a bit too unstable right now to pick fights we don’t need to. He opted to leave it to me to decide if this was a good use of Knight resources. I decided I wanted to talk about it with you. The night you arrived, Christabel told me that she doubted the village was any danger to us. Do you agree?”

“I think so,” Yuri said. “I talked to people there. Most of them seem terrified of the outside world.”

“Some of them may leave,” Estelle said, “like Gideon, the charcoal seller I told you about. But those that do would be refugees looking to start over away from the village. The ones who are truly devout to their lifestyle and would fight to defend it wouldn’t leave.”

Flynn nodded. “Good. I suspected as much. It seems they are not a threat to the Empire. However… there is the issue of the fact that they are technically Imperial citizens. I have a duty to protect them, even from their neighbours. This is what I’ve been grappling with all afternoon - should we go in there and force them to leave?”

“Force them out?” Estelle asked.

“What they’re doing is against the law,” Flynn said. “You said yourself that the man at the market said they’re going to resume their annual sacrifice. From an ethical standpoint, I’m uncomfortable with turning a blind eye.”

Yuri had to think about this. His immediate thought came from a raw memory of being dragged down the hill, the ropes biting his wrists, and the pain of having blood wrung from his arm in front of a crowd of onlookers. The thought of Flynn riding in there arresting everyone involved in that hellish ritual was sweet. Of course, Flynn wouldn’t be riding in to the village of his memory. He would be riding in to a scene of destruction and rebuilding, and most of the people directly involved in that awful night were dead. He had to think about this rationally, not from a place of revenge.

“Honestly… everyone in Yewbrooke is there by choice. They don’t stop people from leaving if they’d rather hack it in the outside world.”

Flynn folded his arms. “They imprisoned you.”

Yuri twisted his arm to rub the scar along his forearm. He really hated defending these people. “That was a special case. Gideon left twice, after all. They tried to encourage us to leave, too. Everyone there has agreed to the terms of living there.”

“It doesn’t feel right, though,” Estelle said. “I just can’t stand the idea of sacrificing a person.”

“We live in a pretty screwed up society, too.” He looked to Flynn. “Our people in the lower quarter suffer for a lot more than one night to allow the nobility to live in the castle.”

Flynn barely hid a wince. “I’m doing my best to fix that, though. I want to make things more equal for everyone.”

“Yeah, and you know I’m behind you 100% on that. Until then, though…. I don’t know, I just think we all live in a pretty heartless society and even though I hate the way they’ve chosen to deal with that, it was still their choice.”

Estelle frowned at Yuri and slowly shook her head. “I don’t feel comfortable with that. Whether it was their choice or not, I just can’t agree with letting a person feel pressured into giving up their life.”

Flynn looked between them. “How about this. I’ll lead a small troop of knights to Yewbrooke. We can frame it as a relief effort and bring them supplies to assist the rebuilding. Before leaving, I’ll pitch the benefits and realities of life in Zaphias and encourage anyone who is hesitant about their ritual to leave. Hopefully, anyone who doesn’t want to be part of their ceremony will feel safe leaving with me. Every few years, I’ll send troops back to check in on them and make the same pitch to any young people who have only recently come of age and are old enough now to make that decision themselves. How does that sound?”

Yuri nodded. “That’s fine with me.”

Estelle looked uncomfortable, but eventually nodded. “Considering the alternative is to arrest everyone and forcibly march them from their homes, I suppose it’s the best we can do.”

“Alright then. Thank you for your advice. I’ll go inform His Majesty. And Yuri - I’ll try to see you tomorrow morning, but in case I don’t, good luck, ok?’ He smiled and squeezed Yuri’s shoulder. “I’m sure everything will be fine, and we’ll be here for you every step of the way.”

Yuri responded with a rare genuine smile and, “Thanks.”

He was almost glad that his pain had acted up tonight. He’d shown up at Estelle’s door, desperate, because he was inches away from grabbing his sword and just hacking the offending limb off himself, which at least had made him more confident that the surgery he’d scheduled for tomorrow was the right idea.

When Flynn was gone, Estelle asked, “Are you nervous about tomorrow?”

“Nah.”

She looked slightly cross. “Yuri.”

“Ok, ok.” He held up his hands in surrender. “A reasonable amount of nervous, I’d say.” Considering how often he got nervous over absolutely nothing lately, he considered this a win.

“Is it more nervous about the surgery itself, or nervous that you’ll end up regretting it?”

“A little of both, but I’m doing my best not to think about either. Once the leg is gone, it doesn’t do me much good to worry about whether that was the best choice or not. It isn’t coming back.”

“That’s true.” She rubbed his shin comfortingly. “And no matter what happens, Flynn is right. We’ll be here for you the whole way, and the rest of our friends will, too.”

Yuri just smiled, a bit too awkward to tell her how deeply her support and friendship affected him. “Now, though… I should head to bed. It’s late and I’m pooped.” He pushed himself up and grimaced as he moved his leg.

“Do you want to stay here tonight?”

“What? In your bed?”

She shrugged. “Why not? It’s big enough. There’s no point in you hurting yourself even more to go back to your room.”

Yuri wanted to protest, but moving set off another stab of pain so he gave in. “Alright then. I think I will.” Yuri made himself comfortable under a sheet and almost laughed when he thought about the first time he’d come to Estelle’s room and she’d locked him in the hallway, ‘just in case.’ He looked at her now, carrying a book to a chair by the window to read by candlelight while he fell asleep. Yuri felt less anxious about closing his eyes and slipping unconscious with Estelle alert and in the room than he had in weeks. Was she really the naive little princess who’d run away with him? The journey had changed her so much, she was barely recognizable. Then again, so was he.

He wasn’t the same guy who had run off in search of the aque blastia. That guy was naive compared to who he was now. Even the Yuri who had come home from Tarqaran seemed different than the one who had come home from Yewbrooke. Still, it was almost funny. By all rights, he should be an anxious mess tonight with what tomorrow had in store. Instead, the presence of a friend he could rely on and the acceptance that he’d never get a definitive answer on what was the correct choice for his leg helped him drift into the soundest sleep he’d had in months.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's a wrap! Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed it!


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